Being Normal Is Overrated
by Obstreperous Wookie
Summary: [Riley Adventure 3] Riley heads to Shoreline to take care of a spirit that is killing college students. But it turns out, a ghost is the least of her problems.
1. What Are You Doing, Tom?

A/N: First of all,** thanks for reading**. Bold, see what I did there? Second of all, there will be more Winchester involvement in the future. Don't worry, I'm working up to it. :) Third, **please drop me a review**! I love them so much! Honestly, sometimes I just go back and read reviews to cheer myself up as I write. Not even kidding. I know, pathetic. Anyways, enjoy!

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Finals week—the bane of existence to all college students. My finals weren't all that hard, both first quarter and now this one. There weren't many curveballs professors could throw at you with drawing, art history, and painting classes. You could either do it or you couldn't, and I happened to be on the high side of the spectrum where my God-given talent for turning what was in my head into something beautiful on paper was actually useful for a change. So yeah, a little studying here and there, and I was good to go for finals.

Libby's finals, on the other hand, were driving her insane. Her school was a week behind mine, so I was already done with two of my three finals, and she was just starting to call me at least every other day, wondering if she was going to fail and then drop out of college and then become a philosophizing hipster working in a coffee shop for the rest of her life. Each time it happens, I dutifully remind her that she is probably the smartest person I know and that there is no reason to panic. She must believe me, because each time, she hangs up and fends off the mental breakdown for another day.

I don't know why she freaks out so much. Maybe her finals were harder than mine. Actually, I knew for a fact that her finals were going to be harder than mine. My first two were pretty dang easy. Well, mostly easy. Well, easy-ish. They would have been a lot easier had none of the regular ghost-y mumbo jumbo interfered.

Suffice it to say, moody artists do not make good ghosts. In fact, the moodier the little bugger, the more violent it can become the second time around—a gem of knowledge I had discovered while dodging airborne paintbrushes and palette knives. Nevertheless, I had dealt with it in a timely fashion and completed my "final" piece of art with time to spare.

Someday, my professor might discover the ashes of the paint easel I had torched. And someday, someone might question why there were so many paintbrush and knife sized holes in the walls, but it would never be actually be traced back to me, and the danger to the other students had been eradicated, so I was calling it even.

So yeah, piece of cake. Kind of. Okay not really, which is why I was now icing my wrist while hunting and pecking on my keyboard using my other hand. Thank goodness it was only my left wrist that was wonky, though, because I still had to take one more written exam tomorrow. And outlining the history of seventeenth century art would have already been grueling enough without a gimp hand to write it down. But I was good to go, as long as I didn't fall out of my chair and land heavily on my left wrist in the middle of the exam. Since I didn't foresee that happening, I was fairly confident on acing or at least doing rather well on the final.

Which reminded me that Libby was overdue with her "anxiety rant" phone call and I was kind of missing her voice. Well, as much as anyone can miss their best friend's voice while scanning through recent deaths on the internet. Whatever. Pursing my lips, I started my daily trawling of the online news sources.

Someone had died of old age in Salem, but it was a suspected overdose on heart medication. Two people had died in Portland, but in a depressingly normal way. In Bend, someone had "fallen" down a set of stairs. That one was vaguely interesting, but there had been no further deaths, so I didn't suspect a haunting.

On the Washington side of things, a Walla Walla farmer had been pinned under his tractor. His nephew swore that something mystical had turned the tractor on its side. But the farmer had also been tested for a blood alcohol level of .07 percent, so I wasn't holding my breath on that one. An Olympia resident had apparently choked on a spoon and died, which was weird, but it still didn't seem like my kind of gig. And then in Shoreline, a lifeguard for the local college had apparently drowned. By herself. In the five feet of water. With no drugs or alcohol in her system. And that—well that was strange.

I Googled Shoreline and got a little bit nervous when I found out that it was only twenty minutes or so from Seattle. Finding the biggest newspaper in Shoreline—The Shoreline Times—I starting combing the archives for previous news.

That's when I found it. The lifeguard had died a one week ago, which was sad, but I had bigger things to worry about. Because before that, another college student had drowned, though she was suspected of being drunk at the time and hadn't been near the lake. Still, both bodies had similar strange bruises on them.

It could have been a random coincidence. It really could have, but at the same time, it could have been more than that. Clicking through issue after issue, I searched for any more deaths in the lake. It took forever, and I was rapidly burning through my study time, but I wouldn't leave it alone.

Then, two coffees and an infinite knowledgebase of all the boring things that had happened in Shoreline for the past few years later, I finally found what I was looking for. I sat back in my chair, stretching my arms up above me and popping my back. Then I yawned and settled forward in my chair, sighing at the wide columns of obituaries. "Tom Sorbenth," I said, covering another yawn with a hand. "Just what are you up to, Tom?" Then I looked around guiltily, remembering I was in a public place, and people don't tend to talk to inanimate objects in public.

It was okay, though. I was completely alone in the little outdoor seating area of the hole-in-the-wall coffee shop. Besides, this was Portland. People were characteristically weird in Portland. Not as weird as people from Seattle, but close. And besides, no one was around to judge my weirdness save for the barista who was busy serving the people inside the shop. I gave one last glance around and went back to my laptop, opened up different browser tabs for each of the pertinent articles I had found.

I stared at my first tab, skimming the article and coming up with a brief mental synopsis. _On August 17, 2010, an elderly Tom Sorbenth died at the lake in question. The obituary said he moved on peacefully—going to sleep next at his favorite picnic spot and simply never waking up. Interestingly enough, the lake was the same place he had both met and then later proposed to his wife._

Then I moved on to tab number two. _On August 21, 2010, Tom Sorbenth was buried in a plot near the lake, and a plaque was inset over the grave due to the sizable donation he had previously given for the upkeep of the area surrounding the lake._

I was still frowning at my screen, somewhat disturbed, when my phone vibrated madly on the surface of the coffee shop table, startling me with its chainsaw impression. "Crikey," I said in disgust, annoyed that all it took to get my heart pounding these days was a little noise.

Then I shook the disgust off, seeing who was calling. "Hey, lady, what's up?" I asked cheerfully, sandwiching the phone between my ear and shoulder.

"Hay is for horses," Libby said, stress making her voice a little snarkier than she probably intended.

_ Love is patient, love is kind_, I reminded myself, holding back my own annoyed reply. "It's also a widely accepted form of salutation," I said calmly.

"Do you even know how many psychologists there are?" Libby demanded. "Why must they all have separate theories? Why? Why?" I envisioned her pulling at her wild curls with both hands. It was a Libby thing.

"Yeah, seriously, tell me about it," was all I needed to say, and Libby was off on her rant. I set the phone down on the table and put Libby on speaker, clicking through some more archived issues of The Shoreline Times as Libby droned on. These ones were more recent, though, from this year. Actually, from like a month ago.

Tab three: _on February 11th, police discovered the grave of Tom Sorbenth partially dug up. It looked to be wild animals, but there was no DNA or fur to confirm it. _

"Yeah, but you have to admit, that kind of makes sense," I interjected randomly at the ten minute mark. I didn't actually know if it made sense or not, but it put Libby on a whole other topic.

In truth, I wasn't totally listening, but hearing Libby's voice was like my version of listening to the radio. It was our thing. I "listened" to Libby talk for as long as she needed to rant, and she accepted that I wasn't actually one hundred percent paying attention. As long as my audience participation was above thirty percent, she was happy. And really, talking was how Libby processed information, so I was providing a way where she could talk out loud and not look like a crazy person.

Tab four:_ on February 19th, a college sophomore, Rebekah Nevans, drown—though not at the lake—at one of the local water fronts._ _She was at a party, and alcohol was a suspected player._

"Definitely," I said, maybe four minutes later, "I've heard that, too." Libby was talking about Abraham Maslow, now, and I was actually listening. I'd always been interested in his Hierarchy of Needs. It was one of the things in psychology that made a great deal of sense to me. But then Libby moved on, and I subsided back into faux listening.

Tab five: _on March 5th, the lady who had originally started my inquiry—the college lifeguard, Kat Ganache—died at the lake under mysterious circumstances._

I sat back, rubbing my chin thoughtfully. When both drownings involved college students, were barely a month apart, and lacked straight forward circumstances or witnesses—well that…that sounded like my kind of case. All in all, it meant that it was possible—for some inexplicable reason—that sweet, old Tom was not so sweet and not so peacefully moved on anymore, which meant that I should probably go to Shoreline and rectify the problem.

Libby went on for a while, bouncing from psychologist to psychologist, and I nodded along, tracking down driving directions and places to stay in Shoreline. "Well, from what I hear, you'll do great," I supplied when it sounded like Libby was winding down. "I mean, you basically just named all the major theorists and what you liked or disliked about their theories. Plus, somehow you always manage to scooch by with an 'A' in your classes, so I'm not too worried."

Libby sighed, and there was a long pause. "Thanks for listening," she said finally. "I just had to get that off my chest. Oh, what about your first two finals? How did they go?"

I readjusted the ice pack on my wrist, fighting the urge to snort. Aside from being attacked by the ghost of a lugubrious, recently deceased artist?

"Piece of cake," I reported.

"Sweet," she said, half in congratulations and half in jealousy. Then she got excited. "And you're still driving up to get me?"

"For sure." I had agreed to drive up after my finals and pick Libby up so that we could both spend winter break at home. It would have been a seven hour drive—one way—for her parents to pick her up. But since Portland was less than three hours away from Seattle, I had agreed to just do it. It was easier that way, and it meant I got to spend extra time with Libby, which was probably what I missed most now that I was in college. We were both kind of pumped about it, actually.

Since my last final was tomorrow, I had several days—five to be exact—until Libby was ready to go. Which was good because I was going to need some extra time to check out Shoreline.

"Awesome," Libby said. "Okay, I have to go study, but I'll see you soon. Sorry I'm so erratic. Finals stress me out."

"Yep, good luck! Love you, girly," I called before disconnecting.

Putting Libby's stress out of my mind, I continued to frown at my computer. There didn't seem to be any other lake related deaths besides the two I'd already found. But this _sounded_ like a haunting, so I was more than willing to check it out. Especially when college students seemed to be the target, and Libby was less than twenty minutes away from the danger zone.

Yep, that settled it. I was going.

My phone buzzed again, and I picked it up. It was my mom, texting me.

_ Good luck with your last final. Can't wait to see you! _her message read_._ Then, a second later, another text arrived. _What are you going to do while you're waiting for Libby? _

I glanced up from my phone to look at the Google maps driving route leading to Shoreline. Then I typed my answer, holding back a snort. _Mostly just working. I might check out some tourist spots near Seattle, though. Excited to see you guys, too! _I sent back.

Another text. _Look at you, working. All grown up and responsible._

I sent back a smiley face, but I didn't feel smiley. Yeah, working—so responsible. More responsible than most kids my age, I supposed. She'd probably assumed I got a job at a coffee shop or something. I snorted again. If only. Tossing my phone away, I sent it spinning across the table.

The barista came out to check on me. "Can I get you another one?" she asked warily. I glanced over at the three paper cups lined neatly along the edge of the table before looking back at her. I'd be wary too if my customer was as caffeinated as I was right now.

"No thanks," I said with a laugh before closing my laptop. "I should probably get back."

"Finals week," she said sympathetically, kindly clearing away my cups and garbage.

"Finals week," I confirmed, packing everything up and heading to the counter to pay up on my tab. The fact that they had allowed me a tab told me that college students often binge drank caffeine during this particular week. They also gave me a student discount, and I left, promising to definitely come back sometime later.

When I got back to my dorm room—which I hardly ever used after first quarter—I was too wired to relax. I sat on my bed, surveying the room, and it came as no surprise that it didn't make me feel at home. It was an empty and kind of depressing space, because I didn't feel like decorating when I only used it once every few weeks. Well, maybe more than that.

First quarter, I had cut Hunting out of my life completely. I had been a regular college student doing regular things. But I hadn't been able to make it stick. So this quarter, I had decided to do a hybrid type thing. I had taken online classes and had done a little Hunting on the side. As a baseline, I'd only had to come back to campus every two weeks or so to take proctored quizzes or turn in pieces of art. The rest of the time I'd been free to travel and Hunt while doing schoolwork on my laptop and sketchpads. Hence the poorly decorated and completely impersonalized dorm room. It was definitely very stark and clinical, which was probably better in the long run, because I mostly just used it for studying. Like now.

Getting off my bed, I pulled out my notes and reviewed my art history, pacing around the room as I developed a rough mental outline of what I was going to write tomorrow. After that, I packed my bags, for no other reason than I wanted to be ready to go right after my final was done. When that was done, I moved on to prepping my Hunting backpack, making sure I wasn't running out of anything. It was a good thing I had checked, because I was getting a little low on lighter fluid and salt. Since those were probably the most important things in my pack, I grabbed my cinch bag and decided to walk to the bus stop and then the store for refills.

One of the things I loved about Portland was that no one cared what I looked like. No one cared that I was buying tons of lighter fluid when I only looked eighteen. No one cared that I was buying salt in bulk. To them, I was just another random customer, and it was glorious. I paid in cash, just like I always did, and left.

Whenever I made Hunting purchases, I tried to pay in cash. That way if, God forbid, I was ever arrested, then there wouldn't be a nice paper trail detailing all the weird things I'd bought. It was a precaution that I might never have needed to take, but I did it anyways.

Hope for the best, prepare for the worst.

I got back to my room around seven, and it was already getting dark outside. Winter—so ridiculous. Stashing my purchases in my backpack, I collapsed on the thin mattress and pulled up Netflix. Stretching out on my back, I set the laptop on my stomach and started binge-watching one of my favorite TV shows. "You can't take the sky from me," I crooned softly at the screen when the song for the title sequence played.

I think I fell asleep that way. Because a great deal of time later, I woke up to my phone going off and the laptop compressing my internal organs. Moving my laptop aside, I groped around the corner of the desk for my phone. My hand knocked it onto the floor, and I scowled.

"Crap. What time is it?" I mumbled, scrambling off the bed to search for my phone. My foot hit it, and it skittered even further away across the floor. "Shuddup, shuddup," I growled, diving after it.

Finally, lying collapsed sleepily on the carpet, I lifted my phone up and saw that it was only seven o'clock in the morning. And Libby was calling. My eye twitched madly, and I fought the urge to hurl my phone away. But I didn't. Instead, I rolled onto my back and answered. "Lib," I groaned, "I love you more than coffee, but not always before coffee."

"Good luck on your final!" Libby practically crowed. "If anyone gives you trouble—knock 'em dead."

"Oh, I intend to," I murmured, not even joking, as I rubbed my eyes.

"Hah, hah," she said slowly, like she couldn't tell if I was serious. Then she became overly chipper. "You can't kill me. I'm an entire state away."

"I've been practicing my telepathy," I reported sourly. "I hate you. Goodbye."

"Love you!" Libby called as I hung up, entirely too cheerful for what time of day it was.

After Libby's entirely rude wake up call, I rustled up one more coffee from the overpriced coffee shop on campus, packed my bags into my car, and reviewed my historical outline. Then I marched myself into the room for proctored tests and sat down.

After what felt suspiciously like mentally regurgitating anything and everything I had managed to remember throughout the quarter, I walked out of the room a free woman. Tossing my school backpack in the backseat, I pulled my Hunting backpack into the passenger seat beside me. Retrieving the directions to Shoreline and the other articles I had printed out, I looked around the already busy parking lot.

I was surrounded by people who were smiling and laughing with their friends while toting stuff out of their dorms and packing their cars up. For a second, I wondered if I'd made the right choice, adding a little Hunting to my life again. If I hadn't, I would be one of them, lightheartedly joking around with my friends as I got ready to leave school for a couple weeks.

Then I glanced down at the pictures of Kat and Rebekah, ones from when they were still alive. In Kat's picture, she was smiling and laughing with friends of her own. I shook my head slowly, shuffling the printed directions back on top of the stack of papers. No, I was doing the right thing. Because of my chosen isolated lifestyle, I might only have one real friend right now, but honestly, I wouldn't have it any other way.

Taking one last glance back at the myriads of college students scurrying around like extremely happy, extremely carefree ants, I turned my attention forward. "Come on, Tom," I said, thinking of the old man that was probably haunting Shoreline. "Let's finish this the way we started it." And although pulling out of the parking lot in preparation of killing ghost wasn't as epic as grabbing my arch nemesis and pulling him off the edge of old ruins, I figured there was never a wrong time to quote Harry Potter.

So I pulled out onto the road, ready to kick some ghost-y butt, and I didn't look back.

Being normal is overrated anyhow.


	2. Mister FBI

A/N: I was worried the first chapter was so boring and dry, so I waited until this one was written. Hopefully it isn't too slow, I am working up to the good stuff. :)

* * *

I drove into Shoreline around noon, completely laidback and casual since I had the case pretty much figured out.

I should have known not to get cocky. Should've but didn't. Again, story of my life.

My first move was to check into a motel on the outskirts of the city. It was small and out of the way, and it had a clean room and a nice shower. I grabbed the essentials from the car and set up shop in the room. The usual.

What I didn't expect were the blaring sirens that passed along on the street. I was experienced enough to be able to distinguish the different emergency vehicle sounds, so I knew right off the bat that two cop cars had just zoomed past, not a fire truck or ambulance.

Cops. That was interesting. Especially since I was in the same part of town where Rebekah had been staying when she had been killed. Cops and three drownings. It could be nothing. They could be attending to some completely random, unrelated matter.

I shifted from foot to foot, chewing on my lip and fingering my keys. In the end, I decided to follow. If there had been another drowning, then I wanted to see the crime scene. Not in a creepy "ambulance chaser" way, but in a proverbial "test the waters" way.

I stopped myself, hand on the doorknob. Oh my gosh. I had just made a water pun while investigating drownings. I was a terrible person.

Dropping into my car seat, I gripped the steering wheel guiltily. Was I being too casual about this whole thing? People were dead, and I wasn't being one hundred percent serious. Was that disrespectful?

It wasn't, I decided. Humor was a defense mechanism. And if I was serious all the time about Hunting, then I would definitely end up in an institution someday. Things were too grim and too dark to be serious all the time.

I followed the general mayhem of cars pulling back onto the road after scooting over for the policemen. It wasn't hard. There was one major three lane road, and the police were headed straight down it.

The cops pulled off along the waterfront docks. I parked a ways away and pretended to browse down the proverbial boardwalk. There were various shops and sidewalk stands, all probably set up for the potential influx of college tourism now that the quarter was over.

I stopped at one, an eyewear vendor, and messed around with a pair of gold aviator sunglasses, using the reflective lenses to scope out the crowded scene behind me.

Four officers were hard pressed to move everyone back. But they did, and yellow crime scene tape was efficiently unspooled and affixed along the perimeter. Officers moved to and fro within the cordoned off area, and people milled around outside the tape. In the middle of the busy chaos—just like the calm in the eye of a storm—lay a white tarp, draped over what I knew was a body. I squeezed my eyes tightly shut for a second, hating that someone else was dead. And if it was another girl that had drowned, then it was probably the ghost again.

There were ten or so people, standing around on the side of the yellow tape closest to me, but I ignored them, focusing on the two ladies in jogging clothes that were just inside the tape. They were talking to an officer, who looked like he was taking their statement. I surmised from their freaked out looks and generally distraught personas that they had been the ones to find the body.

Yikes. I couldn't imagine going running and finding a body. That would be awful. Actually, I couldn't imagine going running in general. I practiced mixed martial arts a few times a week, but that was about it. I was in pretty good shape, but I still liked to reserve running for times of great danger. Running—like meth—not even once. And now I was doing parodies of internet memes. Dear Lord, I needed to get a hold of myself.

Refocusing, I bought the aviators from the lady's stand—mostly because I didn't actually have sunglasses, but also because the lady was giving me the stink eye for fingering the merchandise for so long. I gave her a polite smile and drifted closer to the remaining spectators.

I slipped the sunglasses on my face, taking only a second to decide to push them up onto the top of my head. The day was warm, but it was also kind of overcast, and I would have looked like a weirdo wearing sunglasses without a lot of sun. As I adjusted my glasses in a way that didn't mess up my hair, a man typing on his phone turned from the small crowd and almost ran straight into me. His attention was on his phone, and he didn't even look up to apologize.

_Jerk_, I called after him mentally. Whatever, I had bigger things to focus on. "What happened?" I asked, sidling up to one of the several ladies standing there.

She turned to me, looking doleful. "Poor thing drowned. She was so young, too." Then she turned back, pulling a handkerchief out and blowing her nose. I kept the coldness blossoming in my chest off my face as I looked at the tarp. Another drowning. That made three. Three people killed. This was going to end, I decided. Even if I had to stay here for a month to figure it out, this would end.

"Excuse me, folks, make a path." It was a command, and it wasn't quiet.

I turned to look, just like all the other people around me, and we all parted to either side, making a clear pathway to the tape. A guy in a suit walked through, a badge held up in his hand. He walked past all of us without a second glance. "Special Agent Rinsler, FBI," he told the officer guarding the tape line. The officer nodded and hurried to lift the tape for the agent.

FBI. He might have looked a little young to fit my stereotypical FBI image, but he definitely had the brisk assertiveness down pat. He was talking in hushed tones with the officers, and they were nodding along grimly, so he must be pretty good at his job. I watched, becoming a little more unsettled as he walked over to the body and knelt into a crouch, flipping the corner of the tarp back for a second.

The lady beside me gasped and turned away, but I kept my eyes trained on the body. It was a girl, again, and though I couldn't see her that well, I figured she was probably around my age. Her skin was pale, more pale than I would have thought. But she was dead. Maybe that was normal for dead people. And there, on her throat was the same kind of weird bruising reported on Rebekah's arms and Kat's back.

The agent flipped the tarp back over her head, and pivoted on his heels, suddenly turning back to the crowd. Our eyes met, just for a second, before I looked down and pulled out my phone. Crap. He'd caught me staring—not at the body, but at him. And now he was walking my way. Double crap. I was not prepared to go up against the U.S. Government.

_Calm down, calm down,_ I told myself. _He could be walking towards any one of the people around you._

"You, Miss. With the sunglasses," he called, coming to a stop at the edge of the tape. Shit—I meant…crap. Crap, crap, crap.

I looked up from my phone and made my eyes really big. "Me?" I put a hand to my chest and glanced around as if uncertain, all the while frantically spinning the gears of my brain to come up with a good excuse to be here.

"Yes," he confirmed, waving his hand. "Would you come forward please?" I looked around at the other people, who were now looking at me with varying degrees of confusion. Then I walked forward slowly, my heart pounding wildly.

I stopped a few feet away, not sure what I was going to say if he asked me why I was staring at him or why I was even here. But in the end, I was once again worrying about the wrong thing.

"Did you know her?" Agent Rinsler asked me.

Know her? No, of course I didn't know her. Why would I… Oh. I was a female college student, scoping out a crime scene of another female college student. There was a chance that we went to the same school, or even that I might know who she is. But, of course, I didn't. A normal person might, but then again, I was hardly normal. Whatever, being normal is overrated.

Did I know her? No. I shook my head mutely, unable to meet his eyes, which were boring into me with extreme intensity. "So, you don't know her name? You've never seen her before?" he probed. My eyes flashed up to his, and I shook my head again.

Mister FBI's forehead wrinkled, and he looked annoyed. "Can I ask what you're doing here, then?" _Whoooaap, there it is_, I called internally.

I'd once heard that every good lie starts with a grain of truth, and boy howdy was I about to lie my face off. _A grain of truth, a grain of truth_, I thought frantically.

Boom, Libby.

I looked him straight in the eye and started in on my cover. "Gosh, mister, I'm just visiting my friend at the university." For the most inexplicable reason, my voice lilted into an outrageously smooth Texan drawl, and I had to work hard to keep my disgust at my own stupidity off my face. But the accent had happened, and I was now stuck with it.

Suddenly I was infinitely glad I had worn my hair in a braid that came over my shoulder. I was more grateful that I had paired a light blue plaid shirt with frayed jean shorts and flip-flops. It was a completely terrible wardrobe for Hunting, but it totally worked for stylish good looks and pretending to be from Texas.

Either way, I looked every bit the backwater country girl that I was pretending to be. Maybe that was why I had broken out in an improvised accent. Or it could have just been temporary insanity. Both were completely valid possibilities.

Mister FBI narrowed his eyes, like it was his job to remain skeptical about anyone and everything. Maybe it was. What did I know about the FBI? "And your friend's name is?"

I gave him a wide grin, as if this was finally something I was comfortable talking about. "Sarah Beth. She's a psychology major. Only one of my friends to get to college, 'sides me, of course." I said it semi-conspiratorially, trying to allay his suspicions with my casualness. I also didn't offer too much information. I'd seen the cop shows. The liars tended to be either too vague or way too detailed. I kept myself somewhere in the middle, with details that I could easily remember if needed.

Sarah Beth was the nickname I had teased Libby with when we dressed up as cowgirls in our freshman year of high school. So that was a no brainer, and Libby _was_ actually a psychology major. If he ever needed me to supply either her name or major again, I would easily be able to do so. And if he asked my name, I would give him the nickname Libby had so graciously bestowed upon me back then.

It must have worked because he nodded and started eyeing some of the other witnesses. Then he handed me a card. "What did you say your name was?" he asked casually. I brightened. "Tara Lynn, nice to meet you." I extended a hand, and he shook it, but like he'd lost interest. That was a good thing, though. If I was uninteresting, then I was unmemorable. And if I was unmemorable, then hopefully he wouldn't even think about me twice.

"Well, Tara Lynn, you call that number if you see or hear anything suspicious." It wasn't a demand, but it wasn't quite a request either.

Regardless, I nodded fervently. "Yes, sir." Glancing down at his card, I saw his name was Ted Rinsler, just like he'd proclaimed to the others. Yikes, FBI was a little too high class for me. As I watched his retreating back, I couldn't help but wonder just what had brought an FBI agent to a crime scene in Shoreline.

The only things I could remember—from my extensive and continuing TV watching career—that pulled the FBI in were federal fugitives, terrorists, and serial killers. But this wasn't one of those. I was dealing with a pissed off spirit. Wasn't I?

Crap, crap, crap. This day was just full of crap, and I knew it was only going to get worse.

I waited for a few minutes, so it wouldn't look like I was fleeing immediately after confrontation, and then I split. As I went back to my motel, I made sure I wasn't being followed for no other reason than paranoia. Then I changed clothes, slipping into basketball shorts and sneakers, and grabbed my Hunting pack before getting in my car and driving out to the start of the trail leading to the lake.

_The lake where Kat drowned_, my stupid brain reminded me as I started walking along the trail—as if I wasn't already fully aware that I was actively searching out a lake possibly haunted by an angry spirit. It only took ten or so minutes to reach the lake. I was breaking a sweat in the mugginess of it all, but for some reason I still felt kind of cold.

It was the anger, I realized. The righteous anger that came along with seeing innocent people hurt. Maybe that was why I couldn't stop Hunting. The exploitation and injustice against normal, innocent people angered me in a way that drove me to do something about it. That was why I Hunted, I guess. That was why I chose to help people.

And in light of _that_, being normal seemed terribly overrated.

I pushed all philosophical and self-discovery musings to the back of my mind when I reached the lake. I kept hiking, though, following the trail around the curve of the lake and eventually past it to the plot where Tom was buried. Then, blazing my own trail, I worked through the thick brush and foliage, forcing my way into the small fenced area. The plaque was visible from the trail, but the grave disruption was not.

It wasn't until I was hopping the small, ornate fencing that I saw what had happened to the grave. It looked like someone had, well…that someone had dug him up. Kind of. They had pushed the dirt back in, in a haphazard way, so I could see how it _looked_ like an animal had done it. But I'd grown up in the country, not the city, and I knew better. I'd also worked at an animal clinic for a while. So I knew that an animal wouldn't dig that deep. An animal wouldn't go after a rotting corpse from four years ago. There was no motive for an animal to do it.

People, however, were an entirely different story.

Pulling my little army surplus shovel out of my pack, I began to dig. What I hoped to find, I didn't know. But I dug nonetheless, feeling dirty and wrong for doing it. Tom Sorbenth had died and been buried. It seemed disrespectful to dig him up again.

I stopped, wiping my brow with a forearm. Someone had _already_ dug him up most likely. So really, all I was doing was re-digging. I shook my head and went back to work. Knowing that didn't make it any better. Not even a little. Typical.

An hour later, I was sweating like a pig. Which, I realized, was an odd saying, because pigs don't actually sweat. So really, I was sweating like a human. Yay, for me. I had made good progress, though. The grave was only half empty, and I had just hit the casket a few seconds ago. Apparently, the grave vandals hadn't done quite as good a job filling it back in as they had digging it out. Whatever, it had meant that I didn't have to dig six feet down to get at the box.

Speaking of which, I dragged the shovel across the surface of it a couple times, clearing off as much loose dirt as possible. Then I steeled myself, not wanting to see what was inside, but desperately hoping it was still there.

It was. Kind of.

A little more than half of Tom Sorbenth stared back at me. Thankfully he was just bones at this point, but it was still horrible. And what was worse, it looked like his entire lower half had been stolen, faded threads of a suit and all. Sweat dripped off my face, and I kind of felt like crying. Someone had taken his lower half, and I was going to burn his upper half. Even for a dead guy, that seemed pretty awful.

"I'm sorry," I whispered, clambering out of the hole and reaching for my pack. Salt went into the dirt rectangle, followed by lighter fluid. Then I pulled a book of matches out, lighting one then the entire thing and dropping it in. The gas lit up with a loud whoosh, and I turned away, feeling sick.

Back when I had first started Hunting spirits, I had thought I wouldn't be able to dig up and then salt-and-burn someone's remains. Yet here I was, doing the very thing I had originally found revolting. I still found revolting, really, but at the same time, I knew it was necessary. And I would rather do what was necessary than wimp out and let people get hurt.

I stepped back from the fire, hating the smell of it, and wanting to leave. But, responsible hiker that I was, I decided to stay until it was out, then rebury the man. Or at least half of the man. And then I would need to go find the other half of the man, wherever it may be. Why would anyone want his bones anyway?

After the fire was out and the grave re-dug, I was disgustingly grimy and sweaty. So I got back on the trail and walked to the lake. Despite knowing it was possibly haunted by a spirit that obviously targeted female college students, I crouched on the bank and splashed some water on my face, not wanting to sacrifice my precious little remaining drinking water just yet. Besides, I had my salt gun out just in case Tom decided to show up.

He didn't. But someone else did. The air around me got cold, and a few icy crystals formed on the dripping strands of hair in my face. I spun, suddenly alert, brandishing my salt gun. I needn't have bothered, though.

The spirit wasn't trying to kill me, which threw me for a loop.

It was a girl, maybe in her mid-twenties. She was wearing a shockingly short mini-skirt and a silvery tank top, matched with some flashy cowboy boots. Silver bangles adorned one wrist, and I could clearly see the stamp for some club on the back of her hand. And for some reason she looked kind of shiny, like she was covered with liquid or something.

"Help…me…" she whispered, barely loud enough to hear. I lowered my salt gun, but I couldn't help taking a reflexive step backwards. She disappeared then reappeared right in front of me, but she still didn't try to hurt me. It was disconcerting, to say the least. In fact, all she did was hold out a hand towards me. "Help…me…" she repeated desperately.

"I don't—I don't know how," I stammered, completely taken aback. She flickered in place a little, fading around the edges. "You're dead. How do I put you to rest?"

"Help…me…" she whispered, using the exact same cadence and inflection as before. It was worse, so much worse than facing down a violent spirit. She was so lost, so confused, that I wanted to help her, I really did. Only, the coroner had her remains, so I couldn't salt-and-burn them. I wanted to help her, but I didn't know how, and somehow that made it worse.

"Help," she whispered, big brown eyes rolling to meet mine.

"I don't know how! Tell me how," I pleaded.

One hand went to her throat and the other thrashed around above her. "Help…me…"

I stopped concentrating on her face and tried to look at her from a big picture perspective, taking in the strange sheen about her, her straggly strands of hair, and the awkward thrashing. "You drowned," I said faintly, already having guessed that in relation to the other drownings. "The ghost of the lake got you, didn't he?" But why would just drowning be enough to hold her back? There had to be more.

She shook her head, and her fingers frantically clawed the air in front of her own throat while her face screwed up in panic. Her free hand bunched into a fist and was still thrashing, as if beating against something. My eyes widened, and my hand flashed to cover my mouth as I sucked in a horrified breath. Oh my gosh. My heart started beating a million miles an hour, and I moved my hand down to my chest, as if that would slow it down. "Someone…someone drowned you," I ventured, sickened.

She went unnaturally still, and her dead eyes bored into mine.

"Help…me…"

Oh, crap. What the hell kind of case had I started working?

* * *

My encounter with the newest drowning victim left me shaken. I had thought that maybe Tom Sorbenth was getting revenge for the disturbance of his grave, drowning girls in his rage. But she hadn't seemed to care about his ghost. She hadn't even reacted when I mentioned him, just given me a shake of her head.

So what was it then? What was killing these girls? Three drownings, three college students, three women. Oh, and the FBI was here now, which made everything official.

I froze midstep, having gotten at least one piece of the puzzle into place. Three deaths—no, three murders. Three made it the work of a serial killer, and serial killers were squarely under the jurisdiction of the FBI. Special Agent Rinsler was here because there was a serial killer on the loose. He was probably in charge of checking the deaths out to make sure it was a serial killer. Lovely.

I started walking again, but came to another abrupt stop. Bones. I had salted and burned Tom Sorbenth's bones. But that wouldn't stop him, because more of his bones were still out there. A ghost was the perfect murder weapon. Actually, in my opinion, an icicle was the perfect murder weapon, but a ghost was almost as good. Especially if the ghost could somehow be controlled.

I rubbed a hand over my forehead, wishing that would make things magically make sense. Still, one thing stood out to me above all the rest. It was a question that I would have loved the answer to, one that just kept coming around.

What the hell kind of case had I started working?


	3. Verdant

Disclaimer: I do not own/did not create the nightclub mentioned. It is a nod to one of my other TV shows (yay!).

A/N: Yep. Got nothing.

* * *

My trek back to the car was filled with unanswered questions and coursing frustration. At this point I was wildly unamused with how my day was going and mildly uncertain on how to proceed. So I did the one thing that always seemed to work in the movies. I consolidated all of my information into one big mental list.

First, Tom was missing the lower half of his body. Someone had dug his remains up and taken them for some reason.

Second, something or someone was killing girls. It may or may not have something to do with Tom Sorbenth's missing bones.

Third, the FBI thought the murders were the work of a serial killer. I was inclined to agree, though unsure whether this was strictly a spirit thing or a human thing.

Fourth, the ghost of the most previous victim had shown up at the lake. She hadn't seemed very vehement about being killed by the ghost of Tom Sorbenth, but she had nonetheless shown up at the lake that Tom seemed connected with.

Which meant what? Girls were dying. Tom's bones were missing, and he was somehow connected to all this.

My lip curled up in disbelief at the tiny, random thought that popped into my head. It was ridiculous. Preposterous. It was farfetched, and it was brilliant in a terrible, terrible way.

Someone out there had Tom's bones. Someone out there was killing girls and making it look like random drownings. Tom Sorbenth had been strongly connected to the lake. Tom Sorbenth could very easily drown girls.

Earlier, I hadn't been able to figure out why Tom's ghost was killing those specific girls. I hadn't been able to make connections. But what if it was because Tom wasn't connected to them? If someone else were killing them…someone else who was just using Tom's ghost to do the dirtywork…

It meant that whoever had Tom's bones was probably killing the girls with Tom's help. Help that was possibly the result of coercion or maybe freely given. Either way, it meant that if I found Tom's bones, then I would probably find the killer.

The killer. I stumbled, feeling a little bit sick. I was running mostly on conjecture, here, but it still left me with one undeniable conclusion. If the killer wasn't Tom, then he or she would most likely be a person. A human being. Crap.

Crap, crap, crappity,_ crap_.

I showered, when I got back to my motel room, all the while pondering how I was going to find Tom's bones. How did one go about locating stolen remains? I didn't even know where to start.

At one point I looked down, excited to see that I had some semblance of a tan line where my socks had ended. But alas, even that was a lie. My "tan line" was really just a dirt line, and it washed away along with my hopes and dreams for an easy hunt.

By the time I got out of the shower, it was already six, and I was starving. Lunch had mysteriously passed me by, so I decided a walk to the store would be in order. There was a small supermarket not far from my motel. I had seen it while following the police cars to the docks.

I forewent grabbing my purse—deciding not to carry anything extra that might make me sweat again. Instead, I slipped a twenty into my pocket and walked out the door. The sun was out a little more now, but it wasn't particularly hot, which was nice. I walked, my flip flops making noise as I made good progress down the sidewalks.

Beautiful day, no one was trying to kill me…life was good. Except that someone was killing girls, and I had no idea how to make it all stop. Okay, maybe life wasn't so good just now.

I pondered my bones dilemma as I walked, half wondering what normal people thought about to pass the time. I couldn't imagine anything outside of my usual Hunting or art school circles of thought. Sometimes my mind ventured to food or coffee or guys, but most often, those two topics dominated my headspace. Well, that and media. Movies and TV definitely earned a top three spot in my mental allocations.

So, when my thoughts wandered to random topics like what Libby was doing right now—which was stupid, she was obviously studying—or what it would be like to have a boyfriend, I didn't force myself back on topic. My headspace was dark enough as it was, I didn't need to extinguish the last fading remnants of normal, carefree thoughts.

When the store came into view, I stopped worrying about whether I would end up single and alone for the rest of my life, and I focused on what I wanted for dinner. A sandwich, I decided, without too much deliberation. Maybe peanut butter and jelly. Yeah, that sounded good. Low effort yet still yummy.

Once inside the store, I headed straight for the aisle that proclaimed the presence of bread, and I had to stop myself from giving a satisfied little laugh while I basked in the store's air conditioning. Grabbing a loaf that was both on sale and moderately healthy, I headed off in search of the peanut butter. I passed the refrigerated section in my search, and I had to seriously hold myself back. There were two large sections dedicated to bacon, and they were totally calling my name.

Both health and sanity-wise, I didn't need bacon, so I pulled my gaze from the delicious, artery clogging breakfast meat, and turned down the aisle that contained peanut butter. Of course, there were a million different brands, and as I stood there scowling at them all, it made me want to rethink my position on bacon.

"Tired of PB&J, am I right?" I turned to see a guy walking towards me. He was about my age, and he had his own loaf of bread, which he raised in a salute.

I grinned, motioning with my own loaf of bread. "Yeah, I was thinking PB&J, but I've lost the mood."

"PB&J, the ultimate poor man's food. Hey, you should try this." He pulled a jar off the shelf and handed it to me. I looked down at it, reading the label.

"Nutella?" I asked skeptically. It was apparently chocolate and hazelnut, which didn't sound half bad.

"Nutella," he confirmed. "Nectar of the gods. It's kind of like peanut butter, only ten times better."

"Sure, I'll give it a try," I said, shrugging.

"It's great with bananas. Nutella and banana sandwich. I once lived off them for an entire two weeks. Trust me, they never get old," he grabbed his own jar and turned to leave, once again saluting me. I raised my jar in return and walked in the other direction, thinking I should get some salad to balance out the unhealthiness.

With my armful of groceries, I headed to the checkout stand. The girl behind the register smiled when she saw my Nutella, and I wondered if it was one of those universally popular things that I always seemed to miss out on. Three months ago, it had been plaid, and I was only now breaking out the plaid in my wardrobe. I guess I was just perpetually behind on pop cultural trends.

Stuffing my money in my pocket, I prepared to leave only to stop when I saw an elderly man trying to balance two bags of groceries. The girl behind the register fingered the apron over her Shoreline Community College t-shirt, looking like she wanted to help, but she probably wasn't allowed to leave her post.

I chewed on my lip for a second and put my grocery bag back on the end of the counter. "I'll be right back," I told her, and she gave me a grateful smile.

"Hi, sir, can I help you out to your car?" I said, walking up to the man. He looked a little startled, but I just smiled and offered a hand.

"Thank you," he said, letting me take the heavier bag from him. It had a half gallon of milk and some canned food in it, which is why it was so heavy. The canned food was mostly corn and beans, and I commented on it, telling him that I'd never much cared for canned corn.

He agreed, mentioning his garden and that his corn hadn't done well these past few years, which is why he was buying it instead.

We bonded over small-town, backyard gardens on the way out to his Buick. Upon reaching it, I put the bag of groceries in his back seat and gave him a wave, heading back inside and hating that I was already sweating again. Gah, heat.

The wave of cold air washed over me as I walked back into the store, and I exhaled happily, wondering if I should move to Canada or someplace cold like that. Probably not. I was kind of a wimp when it came to being cold. Or being hot. Or just general temperature alterations not inside my perfunctory range of physical happiness.

I was just about to head back to my bag when I spotted the bananas on display on the other side of the store. I hadn't gotten any, and I had been meaning to as per Nutella Man's suggestion. Register Girl was busy checking out another customer, so I figured I had time to just go to the produce section and get some. I had just picked up a taped together bunch of bananas when one of my normal exhalations turned into me dragon-breathing a cloud of steam.

Oh, crap. Suddenly the air around me seemed entirely too air conditioned.

I spun, turning right around and running back to the baking aisle I had passed a few seconds ago. Grabbing a container of salt, I reemerged, looking around for the spirit. It was nowhere to be seen, but one of the lights to my right was flickering. And, as I watched, the light letting customers know the lane was open flickered. Register Girl's light. Register Girl who wore a college t-shirt. Crap.

The lights went off, leaving the store illuminated only by the sun shining in the windows. I sprinted forward, wanting to get to Register Girl before the spirit had the chance to attack her.

Her scream let me know that it was too late, but I ran anyway. I got to her checkout lane just in time to see a hunched old man wrap his flickering hand around her throat. She was unconscious, slumped over her register, but that didn't stop him from trying to choke her to death.

"Tom," I called, wondering if he would recognize his own name. He turned his head towards me, never releasing her throat. Yep, it was him. I recognized him from his obituary picture.

I whipped the container in my hand at him, sending salt through his murderous self. He dematerialized when the salt hit him, and a few seconds later, the air got warmer. I stood stunned for a few seconds, and then I snagged my grocery bag and ran, realizing that I only had a little bit of time before the lights came back on and the cameras kicked in. No way did I want to get caught on film.

I made it all the way to the back door before everything hummed to life in the store. Slipping around the side of the store, I ran to the front and entered the store with all the other concerned customers. Someone called the cops, and then I was trapped, sitting it out with all the other people waiting to give statements.

From the vague chatter, I gathered they all thought it was some kind of attack. Register Girl was standing at the center, shakily glommed onto Nutella Man's side as she massaged the dark bruises on her throat. I didn't blame her.

The cops got there quickly, efficiently dividing us all up with different officers. I told my officer that I had run in, just like everybody else, to see what had happened. None of us had seen anything except the lights flicker and go out, and we'd all heard Register Girl scream.

I almost got my lying self away from it all, too. I had just finished up my statement—and been told I was free to go—when the man himself, Mister FBI, showed up. He flashed his badge again, scanning the crowd with suspicious eyes. Then his eyes settled on me, and I kind of wished the ground would open up and swallow me.

With long, self-assured steps, he closed the distance between us, simultaneously crushing my hopes of getting out of here and making my heart beat way too fast to be healthy.

"Two crime scenes in one day, what a coincidence." His voice was quiet, and I stopped wishing the ground would swallow me and moved on to wishing my heart would just stop beating.

I shrugged helplessly. "What can I say? Trouble seems to have a way of finding me." My Texas accent was back, and I knew that it was more like I kept finding trouble, but whatever.

"Or you just seem to find trouble." My heart may have actually skipped a beat when he said it. "Interesting circumstances," he continued, "wouldn't you agree?"

I met his eyes, shaking my head. "Couldn't say."

He looked at me, face unreadable, and I wanted to shrink away from his stormy blue eyes. "What was your name again? Marilyn? Carilyn?"

"Tara Lynn," I said quietly, feeling trapped and claustrophobic even though I was outside in a wide open parking lot.

"Right," he said, snapping his fingers and pulling out a notepad. "Can I see some identification, Tara Lynn?" he asked, studying me in a way I didn't like. "It's normal procedure when a person is present at more than one crime scene."

My eyes widened, and my heart skipped another beat as I was firmly caught in my lie. But I looked down at my pockets, once again glad I was wearing my jean shorts. They didn't have much of a pocket, and it was easy to tell there was nothing in there but some money. The corners of the bills were showing, and it was obvious that I didn't have my ID, hallelujah.

"I was just…I was just buying groceries," I stammered, playing off my ten-second panic session as nervousness. It wasn't really even acting, because I _was_ actually pretty nervous. "I didn't… I didn't even think to bring my driver's license, 'cause I walked here."

We stared at each other for a second, and my eyes went even wider, as if I had just realized something. "Oh my gosh, please don't arrest me!" I pleaded, starting to tear up. Okay, now I was acting. Mostly. "I was only getting groceries. I promise! I didn't do anything bad! Please, please, don't arrest me." I even held up my grocery bag, which held the pilfered bananas and salt, the bag of salad, the loaf of bread, and the jar of Nutella.

"Hey, now. Leave her alone. She was out in the parking lot the whole time," Nutella Man interjected, leaning my direction from where he was being questioned by his own policeman.

"He's going to arrest me!" I half-wailed, drawing the alarmed gazes of several of the other shoppers. Nutella Man looked indignant on my behalf.

"Whoa, now. No one is getting arrested," Mister FBI said quickly, raising his hands in placation. "I was just asking her some questions."

"That best be all you're doing, sonny. In my day, we didn't harass no young ladies. 'Sides, she was helping me carry my groceries." It was the older gentleman who had told me about his garden and corn, and I gave an internal cheer for all the people going to bat for me. This was awesome, and I could tell Mister FBI was beginning to regret even bothering me.

I sniffled and knuckled my tears away, trying to look brave in the face of persecution. If a career in the fine arts didn't work out, I was definitely going to look for a job in Hollywood. I may not be as pretty as some of the ladies there, but my acting was dead on.

Special Agent Rinsler took a step back from me, pulling open his suit jacket and putting his notepad away. "You're free to go, miss. Just don't be showing up at any more crime scenes." I could hear the threat behind those words. You didn't have to be a rocket scientist to hear the "or else" tacked onto them.

I nodded, standing my ground and sniffling like a wimp. He gave me one last skeptical look and turned away, heading back through the crowd into the store.

As soon as he was gone, I straightened, wiping my tears away for good. Giving the old man's hand a squeeze as thanks, I walked through the parking lot and back towards the sidewalk. My groceries were heavy in my hand, and my thoughts were heavy in my head.

Another girl had been attacked. I had stopped her death, but if this truly was a serial killer, then it was only a matter of time before she was attacked again. That was the part that didn't make sense, though. She hadn't been drowned. Tom had been trying to strangle her. A serial killer wielding a murdering ghost would be consistent in his or her mode of operation. Patterns. Serial killers were all about patterns.

But the pattern had broken after the third killing.

The FBI had also shown up after the third killing.

So the killer was escalating—escalating in a very dangerous way. It didn't need to look like an accidental drowning anymore. The killer just wanted the girls dead.

That thought turned my chest into ice. How do you fight someone with no face? How do you fight someone you knew nothing about? How do you stop someone when you don't even know where they are or will be?

Suddenly, I wasn't very hungry. When I got back to my hotel room, I put the food on the counter and flopped onto the bed. It was lumpy, but I didn't care. I shut my eyes and wished—prayed—for a some kind of way to proceed.

Because like it or not, I was following this thing through.

Even though I had no idea what my next move would be, I was going to end this weird-ass case once and for all.

I think maybe the Man upstairs might have heard my silent plea, because not long after, I closed my eyes and dreamt. And it was like no other dream I'd ever had before in my life.

I was standing at the docks again, only the crowd around me just kind of faded into the background. Special Agent Rinsler was crouched by the body, looking her over. He turned towards me, only this time he didn't get up to talk. His gun came out from his shoulder holster, and it was trained at me.

"No, wait—" was all I managed to get out before he pulled the trigger. Then I was dead. It felt like it should have been the end, but it wasn't. I showed up at the lake, but there was no one around to talk to, no one around to communicate with. I waved my hands around, trying to turn myself, because for some reason I was floating in the air, all weightless and insubstantial. My body slowly swung around, almost as if I was in zero gravity, and I caught a flash of shininess on my wrist.

It was a bangle. A silver bangle. I looked down at myself, weirded out that I had suddenly taken to wearing a tank top and a really, really short skirt. But I knew this outfit. It belonged to the most previous girl who had drowned. Oh, I was a ghost, then. I looked down at my hand, catching another glimpse of the stamp from a nightclub. I'd noticed it before, back when I'd first seen this particular ghost. It looked like a green V.

"I thought I killed you," said a voice from behind me. I knew who it was, and when I turned, I was once again face to face with Special Agent Rinsler. He surveyed my ghost-y form thoughtfully and whirled a fire poker lazily in his hand.

"I'm trying to help!" I exclaimed as he was getting ready to disperse me with the iron. It was like he didn't hear me, though, and the iron came ripping through me, shredding my essence into tiny pieces.

In the dream, I screamed. In reality, I woke up and bolted upright, panting and gasping as my heart hammered inside my chest. "Jerkwad," I muttered angrily, getting off the bed and padding over to my laptop. Mister FBI was even a jerk in my dreams, goodness gracious.

I was still scowling when I brought up Google and searched for nightclubs in or around Shoreline. But my scowl faded when I came up with a list of about twelve different clubs. There was one, in the outskirts of Seattle, called Verdant. I knew from Spanish class that "verde" meant green, so I clicked on the link. Sure enough, the place's webpage popped up, proudly displaying the green V logo.

Shutting my laptop down, I flopped on my back on the bed and put my hands beneath my head.

Verdant. I had a place to start now. I hadn't needed much, I'd just needed something. And now I had it. The night she'd died, the girl from the docks had been at that club.

And tomorrow night, I was going to be at that club, too. They might not let me inside, but I could sure as heck enact creeper status and stake out the club like the weirdo that I was.

_I'm getting closer, you scumbag_, was my last thought before I closed my eyes again, this time drifting off into dreamless sleep. _I'm getting closer, and when I find you, this ends._


	4. Fiat Man

Disclaimer: Winchesters are not mine. If they were, Sam would be married to Jess already, and Dean would probably be living with Lisa and Ben. *sigh*

A/N: Yay. Hope you're all still hanging in there as this story wraps up. My next story will have WAY more Winchester involvement *teeheehee* :) Geronimo!

* * *

Despite my initial misgivings, the stake-out was actually not too bad. After parking in the very back of the lot, I'd climbed into the passenger seat, so that if anyone passed the car, they'd just think I was waiting for the driver to come back. Plus, it gave me more room to work. I had my iPod going, and I was sketching on my pad, so the time was passing pretty quickly. Well, quickly-ish.

My pencil skated lazily over the paper, and my forehead wrinkled as I searched for inspiration. Nothing was coming to mind as I tilted my head against the window and surveyed the parking lot.

I watched another waitress pull into the wide side alley, where the staff parked, and hustle into the club, waving at the bouncer as she scooted by. I chewed on the inside of my cheek, wary of the whole situation. There was potentially a killer in there. And if I found out who it was, I still didn't know what I was going to do about it. I sighed, dropping forward to rest my head on the dash.

This was so messed up. What was I even doing here?

A face appeared in my mind's eye. Sad, bedgraggled, scared. Big, dripping curls framed a face full of fear and helplessness. I sat up, pencil flicking to life, and I started to draw. First came the hand, reaching out in a desperately inquiry for help. Then came the big eyes, so full of terror and pain. Then the gentle slope of her nose followed by the rest of her face. The hair was harder, because I was trying to make it look wet, just like I'd first seen it.

It was morbid and disturbing, but when I was done, the most previous drowning victim was staring through the page at me. It was a good drawing, easily capturing the emotion that I'd seen before in her eyes and face.

That was why I was doing this. _She_ was why—her death. I was here to make sure something like that didn't keep happening.

I closed my sketchpad and put it in the backseat, having ruined any semblance of a good mood with my recollection of the girl. It was probably a good thing that I did, though, because only a few minutes later, Mister FBI showed up.

He drove a black, nondescript car, and he pulled up and parked with clinical precision and efficiency. I ducked low in my seat, not wanting him to even catch a glimpse of me since he was only a row away.

He did something curious, though, before climbing out. As I peeked over the edge of my dash, Mister FBI pulled out a small box and rooted around in it for a minute. Then he plucked something from it and put the object in his jacket. Setting the box somewhere out of sight, he exited the car and strode off towards the club. Upon reaching the bouncer at the door, he reached back into his jacket and pulled out the familiar ID badge.

It wasn't until the bouncer waved him inside that I dared get out of my car. Tiptoeing like a loony, I scurried over to Mister FBI's car and peeked through his passenger side front window. The box I had seen was sitting on the floorboard, slightly nestled under the dash. It was a simple cardboard box with the flaps tucked down inside it, not much bigger than a Harry Potter book. Inside were what looked like random cards.

I leaned over, cupping my hands against the window in order to see better. It helped, and I was able to make out the general gist of the numerous objects. There were multiple drivers' licenses, each from what looked like different states. There were also a couple different IDs and two different badges. The first, I couldn't tell what agency or place it was for, but it was definitely not from the FBI. The second, I knew from watching the TV show Justified. It was a round circle with a star in the middle, and I automatically recognized it as a US Marshal badge.

I stepped back, puzzled, and leaned against the car next to Mister FBI's. I wasn't a wiz regarding the federal government, but even I knew that there was no good reason to have multiple IDs and badges for different agencies. Unless your name was Jason Bourne—who Ted Rinsler was not. In accordance to the many different IDs, Ted Rinsler might not even be his real name, and he was more than likely not even an FBI agent. Who even knew at this point?

I didn't have time to contemplate the implications of that, because all of a sudden, the doors to the side alley burst open, and a man came running out. He fumbled for his keys as he skidded to a stop next to a grey Fiat, and my eyes widened as I recognized him.

It was the man that had almost run me over while he was walking away from the crowd at the dock. He had been glued to his phone at the time, and he hadn't even looked up or apologized. Potentially Faux Mister FBI's words came back to me. _Two crime scenes in one day, what a coincidence_, he'd said. _Can I see some ID? It's normal procedure when a person is present at more than one crime scene._

This wasn't a second crime scene, but it was strange that I was seeing that particular guy again. Plus, he looked suspiciously like he was fleeing in direct correlation with the entrance of an FBI agent into the building. And if I was taking a page from the potentially faux FBI playbook, I should probably find out why or even if this guy was connected to the whole ghost mess.

I pushed off the door of the car and pulled out my phone, taking a picture of the guy's license plate. I got a good shot of it as he peeled out, and his erratic driving just furthered my suspicions. So I put my phone away, checked around the parking lot one more time, and ran back to my car. Then I upped my creeper-status to full on stalker-status as I started to tail the guy through traffic. It wasn't hard. There were lots of cars and lots of stoplights. I had no problem staying multiple cars away and still keeping Fiat Man in sight.

The horrible feeling in my stomach started, though, when he led me to a more industrial side of town. There were a few warehouses, and he pulled up at the creepiest, most abandoned looking one. He turned off his car with a couple of loud backfires and hoofed it up to the giant sliding metal doors. Ignoring the padlock and chains across them, he slipped right between the doors and out of sight. Typical.

I parked behind an ugly mess of dense trees and shrubbery, slowly sneaking my way closer to his hideout. I wasn't stupid enough to follow him into the dark warehouse, and I certainly wasn't stupid enough to have left my car in plain sight for him to see when he left. No, instead of just rushing on in, I was content to wait him out. I was going to wait until he left, and _then_ I would go check the place out.

My plan worked wonderfully. If "wonderfully" could be considered crouching in the dirt behind a rusting dumpster for a good half an hour. But eventually, out Fiat Man came, and he drove off again with several more backfires. I jumped each time the engine popped, skirting my way around the dumpster as he drove by so that he wouldn't see me.

I waited another twenty or so minutes, just to make sure he was gone and not secretly scoping out the place. Then I stood and stretched my legs out, walking up to the doors and slipping inside, just like he had.

It was dark and gloomy inside, and I pulled my flashlight out of my backpack along with my salt gun. I didn't know what to expect, and in turn, I wanted to be prepared for anything.

I crept along silently, warily skirting around metal beams and weird remnants of shipping containers. There were broken crates and loads of shredded packing plastic strewn about, but the worst thing was the dirt floor. It ate up the sound of my footsteps, and it made everything insanely creepy and silent.

Darkness and silence—one of the most terrifying combos ever. Yet at the same time it was kind of comforting. Silence meant that I was alone, more or less. And if I was alone, then I was not in the presence of a serial killer. And of the two, I would totally choose silence over a serial killer. Silence also meant that I could potentially hear things sneaking up on me. So, yep, silence was good.

My phone went off, vibrating wildly in my pocket and scaring the everloving crap out of me. My heart beat wildly as I transferred my salt gun to the same hand that held my flashlight, fishing with my free hand for my phone. I didn't recognize the number, but it had the same area code as a certain towering Hunter that I kept on speed dial. Wonderful timing—right smack dab in the middle of the only time I really needed to be quiet.

"Hello?" I answered casually, trying to keep my voice down but not sound suspiciously hushed.

It was Dean. He didn't bother saying hello back. "What's this I hear about a new Hunter based out of Oregon?" he asked sharply.

I peeked around another crate and came up short when I found a weird table thing right in front of me. It had a table cloth on it along with a bunch of other weird crap. More than that, it looked oddly close to something akin to devil worship. Or the pop cultural version of devil worship, anyway. It was like something out of a bad horror movie.

My mouth pulled into a confused frown. "Uh…complete and utter fabrication strictly unrelated to myself?" I said almost questioningly, studying the creepy altar in front of me. "I spend my days doing homework and working towards a degree in the Fine Arts." That was totally true, so long as omitting my Hunting extracurriculars wasn't lying. Which it was. Okay, it was totally not true, then.

I tilted my head to the side with a frown and scratched the side of my head with a finger, taking in all the ritualistic mumbo jumbo littering the altar. "I'm even studying some unconventional art right now, in fact." Technically, that wasn't even a lie since the table had lots of weird symbols painted on it in red paint. Or what I hoped was red paint. And the whole thing looked like some of the stupid "modern art" sculptures I had seen at museums. Art, shplart—it was all just crap if you asked me.

Across the top of the table were candles galore, spread in random arrangements, and they were getting pretty short—with dried pools of wax around them—like they'd been used enough to reach their current length and not just made that way. Along with the candles, there were several small wooden bowls that looked hand-carved, and they held all manners of weird things. I didn't want to even begin to guess what the items were. Suffice it to say that all of them couldn't possibly have held things that were easily, or even legally, procured.

However, it was the centerpiece that was most disturbing. At the center of the table was a white cloth, painted with the red symbols that I was "studying." Sitting on the cloth was a large silver chalice, and it gleamed wildly against the glow of my flashlight. "Yep," I said, trying not to be completely creeped out, "just studying."

"Good," Dean grunted, sounding like he actually believed me. Maybe my lying was getting better. I wasn't sure how I felt about that. I pursed my lips and leaned over the silver cup to see what was inside.

I really shouldn't have.

There was thick, red liquid pooled at the bottom, and I didn't even have to guess to know what it was. Even worse, there were three different locks of hair, and I knew they were from the three girls that had been killed. One was blond, and another was brown and curly, just like the latest victim's had been. There were also a ton of pieces and fragments of bones, which meant that I had most likely discovered the missing half of Tom Sorbenth. Oh joy.

I sighed, surveying the entire altar with disgust, not even sure how to proceed. This was way out of my league. Ghosts, I could handle. Voodoo altars or whatever this was, not so much.

_Fortunately_, I happened to be talking to a guy who might know how to deal with it.

_Unfortunately_, I had just finished up telling him how normal I was supposedly being.

I rubbed my forehead with a sleeve, grimacing and fighting the urge to find a wall to bang my head against. "Hey, Dean?"

"What?" He sounded tired, and I felt a little bad, but I still needed answers.

"Hypothetically, if there was a ghost that was maybe, like, forced to kill girls, and someone somehow stumbled upon a weird-ass altar type thing in the middle of a creepy, abandoned warehouse, then the best way to deal with it would be…"

His hand slapped down against the surface of something, making me flinch even though the noise was just coming through the phone. "Damn it, Riley, you were supposed to stay out of this life," he growled.

"No, you said to _try_ and be normal," I pointed out quickly in my own defense. "Well, I totally did. It wasn't my fault that Libby's house was haunted."

"Oh, and I suppose Libby is forcing you to Hunt in the entire state, too?" I thought back to his original accusation of being the new Hunter based out of Oregon.

"Don't be ridiculous," I said glibly. Then, after a pause, I conceded. "It's actually two states." Then I hurried on before he could say anything. "And really, how much crap can happen in just two states? Case in point, you and Sam have to bounce from state to state to find jobs."

Actually, the answer to my question was "quite a lot." I was mostly working out of Oregon, with the occasional side trips into Washington to make sure Libby didn't get herself killed. But it was more work than it sounded like. Libby was in Seattle, and seriously, Seattle people were crazy.

Like now, for instance. I wasn't investigating my typical, normal little haunting. Oh, no. No way was it that simple. Right now, I was staring at an altar that someone was using to get a ghost to take care of their personal vendettas. Not a ghost. Not a serial killer. It just _had_ to be a mash-up of the two. Frigging Seattle people.

Still, Dean didn't have to know just how busy I'd been lately. I'd keep that one to myself. Though, if he'd been hearing word of a Hunter based out of Oregon, then maybe my work was getting around. That particular thought filled me with a weird sense of pride and then a flash of unease. Should I be proud about killing things, even if they _were_ bad things? I mean, it wasn't exactly something you could pad your resume with. And did I really want to garner a reputation as a killer? I didn't have an answer to that either.

Luckily, Dean snapped me out of my thoughts. "You're going to get yourself killed. And when you do, what's your family going to say?" He had a point, but then again, it wasn't anything I hadn't already debated with myself about since the start of this whole Hunting thing. So I plied him with the same answer I continuously ended up with during my ongoing self-debates.

"Look, I don't know if you were really paying attention to the whole 'Turn Riley Into a Vampire Phase,' but let me fill you in." I paused, just for effect. "I almost got turned into a vampire. And kidnapped. So really, I'm living on time that I shouldn't have had in the first place." I let him stew on that before hitting him with the whammy. "You and Sam saved me when probably no one else could have. So how can you expect me to do anything less for someone else?"

He sighed and took a drink of something. I could hear the clink of ice and his swallow. Part of me sympathized and wanted to join him. Then the rational part of me kicked in, and I remembered that I was only nineteen. It was too early in life to start hitting the bottle, no matter how old and mature I felt these days.

"Dean, listen—" I said slowly.

"No, you listen," he said, cutting me off. "Sam and I grew up in this life. We know what we're doing. You can't just take care of one ghost and then assume you're a Hunter."

"Oh please," I snorted. "All Hunters start out somewhere. It's the same old story. Encounter with the supernatural, unintended consequences, and boom—new Hunter." I suppose the fact that I had actually survived a vampire invasion and salted-and-burned nine spirits and put two changelings out of commission made my tone a little sharp and annoyed.

I think Dean sensed it too, because he went silent for a long moment. When he spoke again, his tone was rough and tired. "You know what? If you want to get yourself killed, fine. I don't have the time or energy to argue about it. Just don't expect Sam and me to come bail you out if you get in over your head, which you will."

I took a step back, kind of stunned, and a slow grin spread across my face. "I understand," I said dutifully, acknowledging his disclaimer. If I got myself killed, then it was my own dang fault—that much was clear. But I knew that they would still come. If I called them and truly needed help, they would come. That was just who they were.

"Write this number down," Dean said sharply, like he was done with this conversation. He listed off a phone number, and I toed it into the dirt—not having anything to write on—before repeating it back to him. "Name's Bobby Singer. He's a friend of ours. Knows a lot more about monsters than me or even Sam."

"Okay, thanks. And about that altar?" I chewed on my lip again, wondering if he would still help me.

"Knock it over. And when in doubt, torch it." Good old Dean.

"Got it," I said, resting my foot on the edge of the altar. Shoving hard with my leg, I sent the table crashing onto its side. The candles and bowls of weird stuff went flying, and I pulled a container of lighter fluid out of my backpack, squirting the flammable goodness all over the mess. I paid special attention to Tom's remains, squirting them with an overly liberal dose of lighter fluid and tossing a handful of salt over them.

"Riley?" Dean asked, his tone changing from weariness to a kind of melancholic pensiveness. "What happened to having a normal life?"

I thought about giving him a cheap, witty response, but something stopped me. I pressed the phone to my cheek with my shoulder and pulled my backpack around to the front, resting it on my thigh as I put the lighter fluid away and zipped the pocket closed again. "It didn't work out," I said finally, shoving my backpack around and onto my back with a little more force than necessary.

Then I hesitated, chewing on the inside of my cheek."I tried for months to forget what happened, to move on. But in the end, I just kept seeing you—bursting through my bedroom door. You saved me, Dean. And after that, I couldn't just go on with my life pretending like everything was normal. Not when someone else out there might be dying because no one bursts in to save them."

I faltered, for a second, becoming strangely emotional. "It might have started out with taking down the ghost in Libby's house. After that, it was just some stupid haunted house she went to. And then after that, even, it was just me making sure she didn't wander around and get herself killed. But now? Now I can make a difference, Dean. And even if it's only a few ghosts here and there, I can help people…the way you helped me."

I twisted the toe of my Converse in the dirt, making a perfect circle inside my flashlight beam as I sought out the correct words to explain. "You know that Spider-man quote? 'With great power comes great responsibility.' Well, I kind of feel that responsibility. If I have to go through life knowing that monsters and the things of nightmares are real, then I'm at least going make use of it. Hardly anyone knows about this stuff, and that's definitely a good thing. Heck, I almost wish that I didn't know any of it. But I do, and if I have to know, then I'm at least going to do something about it."

I was desperate, then. Desperate that he understand what I was trying to say, desperate that someone—anyone—finally understand the struggle that had been weighing on me all this time. And, because I had seen a similar kind of weight on him, I think he did.

He sighed, and I could imagine him running a hand across his jaw. "Well, kiddo," he said slowly, "maybe you're meant to be a Hunter after all."

My eyebrows shot up, and I let out a choked little laugh. "Maybe," I agreed, scrubbing a sleeve across my eyes. Why was I tearing up? Gosh dang did I need to get a hold of myself.

"And your parents think you are, what, traveling around for shits and giggles?" He sounded distracted now.

"Pacific Northwest College of Art—Portland, Oregon," I explained, reaching back around to the side pocket of my backpack and pulling out a lighter. "My professors all say that I'm incredibly imaginative and wildly talented. I send home their glowing reviews all the time. My parents just don't know that I'm taking online classes. So, I really only have to check in on campus and turn in my pieces every two or three weeks. I'm an exemplary student."

"Of course you are," he said dryly.

I stared down at the phone number I had carved into the dirt, realizing how many doors that had possibly just opened for me. Then I bit my lip. "Dean? I saved a mom and her little boy. It felt…right. Good, even."

He sighed. "It always does…when you save them. But when you're staring down a barrel or a blade at some mook, and you know you have to end them, but you also know they're probably someone's daughter or mother or son…well, it doesn't feel so good, then. But you finish the job, because that's what Hunters do. And you have to live with the lying and the killing and the fighting, knowing that at any moment, it might be you that doesn't walk away from a job. That's something you'll always have to live with, and the weight of it adds up pretty quickly."

"I know," I said quietly, and I did know. Back when I had first discovered that supernatural things existed, my boss and friend, Sara, had been turned into a vampire. It had been days before I realized what had happened, and in those days I had waited and hoped to hear from her. Then she'd been killed, albeit while on her way to kill my family, and I had hated that she was gone, hated that no one would know what had happened to her. She had been turned and then killed in the space of a week, just blinking out of existence like she'd never been there. And then I'd had to go around lying my face off about it—to Libby, to my family, to the cops. It had weighed on me. It still did.

But I was doing this. I was Hunting. Because I could. Because if I did, then maybe—just maybe—some other seventeen year old girl wouldn't get a rude awaking in the form of monsters. Maybe some other mother wouldn't have to go home and face a life-sucking changeling child. Maybe some other college girl wouldn't get drowned by a serial killer wielding a pet ghost.

My future was full of maybes, but one thing was certain. I was Hunting, and I was reasonably good at it. "I got to go," I told Dean, having nothing else to say.

"Yeah," he agreed, still not sounding happy as he hung up. The warehouse morphed into silence again, and just like that, I was alone to face the consequence of my choice.

I sighed, shaking my head slightly as I entered the phone number for Dean's "Bobby Singer" into my phone. Then I kicked the dirt over the scratched out numbers, wiping away the evidence. Somehow conversations with Dean always managed to leave me reeling. "Whatever," I muttered, stuffing my phone back into my pocket before flicking the lighter and producing a flame.

There was a small noise at the door of the warehouse, and I spun, sudden adrenaline exploding throughout my body. Fiat Man shouldn't be back, and I definitely would have heard his rust-heap backfiring if he had driven up. But I hadn't heard anything, so who was here? It probably wasn't the ghost, and nobody else knew about this place. Nobody else—

Oh. Who else would have cause to investigate this warehouse? Who else would have put the pieces—apparently ridiculously quickly—together? Potentially Faux Mister FBI, himself. That was who.

"You got a proclivity for pyrotechnics, Tara Lynn?" came his slow drawl through the darkness. I looked at the lighter in my hand, and the flame wobbled and danced against the darkness. Why yes, yes I did. But that wasn't the issue here.

I squeezed my eyes tightly shut and dropped my head in defeat, wondering if my luck could get any worse. Ghost, check. Serial killer, check. Random man who had impersonated a federal agent and was now alone with me in a dark warehouse, check.

Awesome. My life was just awesome.


	5. Finn

A/N: Another chapter! Thanks for the reviews. They are awesome! Anyways, enjoy! One more chapter(ish) of this story, and then the Winchesters will be back! Woohoo! Stay tuned (dang that sounds cheesy).

References: If you haven't seen the TV show 24, just type Jack Bauer into Google Images, and you will understand :)

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Instant recap? I was alone in the dark with a man that was pretending to be a federal agent.

Instant realization? I was currently unarmed save for a lighter and a flashlight. Sure I had a machete and some hairspray in my backpack, but I didn't have time to go for them. Besides, Mister FBI had a gun. I'd seen in his shoulder holster both times he'd questioned me.

Oh joy.

I turned halfway back towards the altar, keeping my flashlight trained on the most likely spot Mister FBI was going to appear. I didn't let go of my lighter, though. Not yet.

"Well, if it isn't Special Agent Ted Rinsler, FBI," I said with a cheerfulness that I most certainly didn't feel. "I guess we both know you're not really FBI now, don't we?" I didn't bother with my over-the-top Texas accent. There was no point. Both of us were just ourselves now, no extra fluff needed.

Ted—or whatever his real name was—stepped into my flashlight beam. He had a gun leveled at me—a real gun, not the toy kind full of salt that I carried around.

He was wearing a suit, just like all the other times I'd seen him, but the tie was loose and the shirt partially untucked. Even disheveled, he looked like a professional bad-ass, and it was dang attractive, but he also had a gun pointed at me which kind of killed the feeling. Suddenly, he reminded me of a younger, less angry Jack Bauer.

His left hand was crossed under his gun hand, holding a flashlight. And the beam swept up across my face and then to the lighter I held.

"Drop the lighter," he said coldly, bringing the light back to my face. For a second, I wondered if he thought I was the one who was killing people. If I was the one summoning ghosts. Whoops, maybe I shouldn't have been so snarky and deceitful towards him.

I shrugged, squinting against the brightness, and let the lighter fall straight into my pool of lighter fluid. Flames jumped up, quickly spreading over the bones and table and spilled crap. Mister FBI recoiled a teeny bit in surprise, but otherwise remained composed. I was impressed with his self control. A second after I lit the fire, the spirit appeared off to the left, behind the burning table and mess.

He was old, and his gnarled hands were resting at his sides. "Adios," I said sadly, watching as Tom remained still and calm while bursting into burning embers and disappearing. He didn't scream or fight it, just moved on like a champ. That made him the second spirit I'd met that hadn't tried to kill me. Maybe ghosts or spirits weren't all bad.

After Tom moved on, I dropped my hand to my side, realizing then that I was alone with a pissed-off, gun-toting man and yet another fire.

Typical. Riley. Luck.

"You're not from Texas, are you?" Mister FBI asked slowly. The glow from the fire washed the whole warehouse in cheery warmth, and I was painfully aware of the light glinting off his gun. He didn't lower it, but he _did_ look marginally less likely to shoot me on spot, which was a plus.

Besides, asking about my accent and back story before freaking out about a ghost? Mister FBI was a definite Hunter.

"Nope. Just like you're not really FBI," I countered.

"True," he said, giving me a conciliatory nod.

"Truce?" I queried, remaining motionless lest he get the urge to put a bullet in me.

He shrugged, not saying anything, but he lowered his gun, and I took that for an affirmative. "How did you know? That he'd go after the girl in the store," he grunted, eyes narrowed. If I didn't know any better, I'd say he was frustrated that I beat him to the proverbial ghost-toasting punch.

I wanted to fling my hands in the air in exasperation, but I kept still. I didn't need to make any sudden movements, not when he'd only just lowered his weapon. "I told you. I was just getting some groceries. Complete coincidence." I pondered our dilemma for a second before coming up with a question of my own. "How did you know it was a ghost? The cameras were out."

That was one thing I wanted to know. If I hadn't actually seen the ghost attack the girl, then I wouldn't have put the pieces together by just showing up at the crime scene. It would have looked like a random assault, not a haunting.

He shrugged again, tongue in cheek as he ran a hand over the stubble on his jaw. Even that simple action made me want to stare at him, and I had to mentally slap myself back to the matter at hand. "Lights and electricity went out. Temporary temperature fluctuations according to the store's computer systems. Salt at the register." He was precise and clipped as he listed the reasons off, almost like I already should have known those things.

I nodded, remembering that I'd flung salt at Tom and hadn't cleaned it up. "So you're a Hunter, then?" I plied. Fake IDs, knowledge of the supernatural. It made sense. I just wanted to see if he'd admit it.

His eyebrows went up. "Aren't we both?"

It was my turn to shrug. "Part-time." I was just trying to lighten the mood and get rid of some tension, but he just stared at me, like he didn't know how to respond to that. Then he shook his head, running a distracted hand through his hair as he surveyed the burning altar.

"You got the bones?" he asked quietly. It was an honest question, but one tinged with a little bit of mistrust. I couldn't really blame him. He didn't know me. He didn't know if I was careful or if I was a good Hunter. It was smart of him to double check. Smart Hunters lived longer.

"Yeah, both the buried half of him and these ones." It was kind of weird, finally talking to someone about what I'd done. As if digging up a person and setting the remains on fire wasn't completely crazy.

"He was using the spirit to kill the girls, wasn't he?" Mister FBI said. It wasn't a question, not really, and I didn't have to ask who "he" was in that particular equation. There was only one person it could be.

"Yeah." It was my turn to answer quietly, the weight of the matter sucking the lightness out of my tone. Yet, despite the morbidity of the conversation, one question was burning away in my mind. "How was he making Tom kill? Tom wouldn't have hurt anyone, not if he had a choice."

"Necromantic summoning ritual, probably. There's a talisman that can be used to control the spirit once it's summoned."

I stared over at him, realizing ridiculous it was to have conversations like this. Dang, we were so weird. But I kind of liked it. I'd never met another Hunter, besides Sam and Dean. It made me feel not quite so alone.

"What?" Mister FBI demanded, breaking me out of my lull. I jerked my eyes off of him and glanced back towards the flames.

"Uh, nothing. Just…we should get out of here. Wait for him to come back, you know?" I thought I presented the request fairly neutrally, but Mister FBI just stared at me again, and it was a lot like when Dean stared at me. Only instead of green eyes, it was stormy blue eyes that were sending laser beams of intensity my way. Jeez, maybe they took a class on it or something.

"Yes," he said finally, taking a long time to deliberate before turning heel and walking out. I moved my eyes left then right, wondering if he was seriously just going to leave me. Then I hurried after him, not giving him the chance.

I caught up to him right as he slipped out the door, and I ducked under the chain, too, sucking in a deep breath of clean air. It was starting to get a little dark outside, mostly because the sun was behind clouds, but also because it was starting to get later. It was still odd, though, because it seemed like just a minute ago that I'd trailed Fiat Man here.

Like me, Mister FBI hadn't parked in plain view. I trailed behind him uncertainly, not really clear on the game plan to take down Fiat Man. However, once we reached his car, Mister FBI opened the passenger door for me like a gentleman, and I slid into the seat with a polite smile. He got in as well, which marked the start of a very awkward silence. Most of the time, I was just fine with silence. It didn't bug me, but this time it kind of did. I was sitting in the car of a guy I barely knew, and we were waiting for a serial killer to come back so that we could…kill him.

We were waiting to kill someone.

My stomach twisted violently at the realization, and I felt sick. Murder. Murder was what I was contemplating. Yes, it was a bad guy, and yes, I was saving people. But that didn't make it anything less than murder.

I didn't…I didn't want to think about.

Thankfully, I didn't have to.

"Is your name really Tara Lynn?" Mister FBI asked, out of the blue.

I glanced over at him, surprised. Then I shook my head. "Nope. Not even close."

He was quiet for a moment. "Who are you?" he asked—making me flash back to the first time he'd asked me that. This time he sounded more curious than interrogatory, though, and it was nice.

"Riley," I replied honestly, leaving off my last name. I had a family, a family that could be hurt by what I did. So I didn't tell him my last name, just like I never took any ID with me on hunts. And I'd never been fingerprinted, so I wasn't really in the system yet. It was best that way, having nothing that could be used to trace back to my family. It was a smart move on my part.

Actually, it was that kind of depressing forethought that made me wonder if I was ever supposed to be normal. I mean what kind of person thinks about that kind of thing?

"And why are you here?" Mister FBI was slightly annoyed, but I didn't care. I'd had enough people question my actions, question my judgment. I was here, and that was all that mattered. Actually, Sam and Dean had complained on the basis that I was too young and had too much of a future to Hunt, but that didn't seem like Mister FBI's thing. He wasn't that much older than me, I could tell. He just genuinely didn't get why I would be Hunting in the first place.

"That does seem to be the question, doesn't it?" I said, tapping my chin thoughtfully.

He was less than pleased, and we were back to silence. It lasted long enough that I was starting to regret my pithy response. Then he surprised me again, suddenly extending a hand towards me.

"Finn," he said, without his usual brusque tone. Finn. That was a nice name. It fit him.

"Nice to meet you," I said, shaking his hand steadily.

We lapsed into silence again, but it wasn't quite as awkward and tense. Nonetheless, my thoughts took me to places I didn't want to go. And once again, Finn brought me out of it.

"How did you know to go to the club?" he asked curiously. "Did you break into the morgue to look at the body and personal affects?"

My eyes widened, because I hadn't even contemplated doing something that outlandish. Though, that would have been a good way to go. "Saw the girl's ghost," I said, after thinking about it a while. "She had the club's stamp on her hand."

Finn twisted in his seat, looking me straight in the eye for the first time since the warehouse. "You saw her ghost? Just…saw it?"

I shrugged and looked down at my hands, uncomfortable with the sudden scrutiny. "Went to the lake to check out Tom's grave. Saw her on the way back. She asked me for help." I neglected to mention the crazy dream I'd had—the one that had actually led me to the club conclusion, the one featuring Finn. Yeah, I wasn't feeling particularly inclined to share that part.

"You…talked…to it. Just…talked to it?" He looked so shocked, and I lifted my hands helplessly.

"Yeah," I said. "She asked me for help, and I asked who killed her."

Finn's forehead wrinkled thoughtfully and he shrugged. "And the warehouse?" he probed, like he still couldn't believe my last answer.

"You went into the club, and he came running out. I'd seen him before, at the docks, so I followed him." It didn't feel like a big deal to me, but it seemed to annoy Finn.

"You followed a potential serial killer back to his base of operations, and you went in unarmed?" When Finn said it like that, it sounded bad, but I wasn't about to let him bully me.

"I waited until he left. Then I went in. And besides, I wasn't completely unarmed." I had to keep myself from snapping at him. What was it with guys and assuming I was a completely helpless damsel in distress? I was pretty good in a fight, and the machete in my backpack wasn't just for looks. Though, in a way, he was right. I didn't have a gun, and in the warehouse, if Finn had been a bad guy, then he could have easily killed me. So that was something to think about.

I crossed my arms and stared out the window. I wanted to ask him how he'd figured it all out and gotten here, but I was too steamed. All of a sudden, Finn leaned across my lap, opening the glove compartment in front of me. He pulled a gun out and set it on the dash. Then he removed the gun from his holster and began to disassemble it.

I leaned back against the headrest, watching Finn work with half my attention and keeping an eye out for Fiat Man with the other. It was comforting, I realized, smelling the oil Finn was using to clean his gun. It reminded me of Dean, cleaning his and Sam's guns all that time ago. And although I would never admit it out loud, I liked that smell. It was a safe smell, or at least a smell I equated with being safe, which was ironic at best.

"So…do you think I could get a gun?" I asked, somewhat out of nowhere. Finn stilled beside me and looked up from where he was cleaning the inside of the barrel. I think he was trying to figure out if I was joking or not.

"Do you know how to use a gun?" he asked neutrally, as if he wasn't completely opposed to the idea. That much was good at least.

My forehead scrunched, and the tip of my tongue appeared at the corner of my mouth. I kind of knew how, theoretically. "Eh," I said slowly. "Point and shoot?" Finn's neutrality vanished, and he looked utterly annoyed.

"It's not a camera. It's a complex piece of weaponry," he said with a tiny bit of condescension.

I sighed, rolling my eyes. "Load the mag, pull back and release the slide, click the safety off. Point. And. Shoot." Beside me, Finn stopped cold.

"So you do have experience with a gun," he said flatly.

"Watched eight seasons of 24," I said matter-of-factly, and then I winced, realizing how feeble that was. Yeah, I had no experience, and I should probably not have a gun under any circumstances.

Finn muttered to himself, going back to cleaning, and I took that to be a no. Whoops. And yet again, we were back to silence. Awesome.

It took three hours before Fiat Man showed back up. Three torturous hours for me to wonder what Finn and I were going to do when Fiat Man came back. Neither of us had said much in the past few hours, and neither of us had really moved. I was lost in my own worried thoughts, and I had no idea what Finn was thinking about.

Still, as I heard the familiar backfire, my stomach cramped in uncertainty. Finn went for his gun, checking the magazine and then sliding it back into place. I focused on slow, deep breaths.

Fiat Man scurried out of his car, something clutched in his hands. It was round, and it looked almost like a dream catcher. "The talisman," Finn murmured. "He's going to kill again."

I wanted to vomit, but Finn didn't seem entirely bothered by the fact that we were gearing up to go kill somebody.

"Here," he said, handing me the extra gun off the dash. His face was grim, as if this was against his better judgment. It probably was. I wouldn't have given me a gun either. "Just don't shoot yourself, okay?" He started to climb out of the car then paused, throwing a glance over his shoulder at me. "Don't shoot me, either."

I nodded, and he got out, leaving me to stare down at the piece of metal in my hands. It wasn't big or fancy or sleek. It was black and cold and powerful. And it was mine, Lord help us all.

Finn walked silently up to the warehouse, radiating the same cool confidence I had noticed on his first FBI impersonation. I trailed behind him slowly, feeling my palms start to sweat against the cold metal of the gun.

Were we really going into an abandoned warehouse to kill someone?

Finn dipped under the chain and disappeared into the darkness. Okay, yep. That was a yes. We were doing it. Inside, as we crept forward, I could hear angry yells, which I assumed was Fiat Man discovering the little playdate between my lighter fluid and his altar. _Sorry, bub. No spirits for you, today_, I called snidely.

Out of nowhere, Fiat Man came blasting around the corner. My eyes had adjusted to the dark, and I think his had to, because as soon as he saw Finn and me, he skidded to a stop. "You," he snarled. I didn't know to which of us he was referring to, but it didn't really matter.

Suddenly he was moving again, and a gun came out from the waistband of his pants. My heart seemed to stop, and I didn't have time to see if his eyes glittered with unchecked fury or some descriptive crap like that because all I wanted to do was to very much so not get shot. I dove behind a crate at the same time gunshots broke out. They were loud, louder than they seemed on TV, and I flinched behind my cover. Off to my left, Finn returned fire, lighting up the room with bright bursts of light. Muzzle flash, I think it was called.

Content to let them shoot it out, I crawled back towards the door. I wasn't fleeing, necessarily, I was just thinking ahead. Fiat Man would be looking for a way out. If he got past Finn, then this was his most likely exit.

Sure enough, pounding footsteps and heavy wheezing followed me in the hazy gray. I jumped up, gluing myself to the backside of a pillar, and waited. Fiat Man appeared a second later, and I stepped out, clotheslining him with my forearm. It wasn't a very impressive maneuver, but it was crazy effective. Fiat Man went down in a wheezing lump, and I kicked his wrist several times until the gun went skittering away.

Then it was still, save for our wild breathing.

I stared down at him, gun trained steadily on his chest. I wasn't scared or nervous; I was cold, indescribably cold. He looked up at me, and I looked down at him, both of us judging and measuring the other.

He was in his thirties, maybe. Brown hair, round face. Nothing too out of the ordinary. I wish I could say his eyes were dead inside, and that he looked like a merciless killer, but he didn't. He looked like he could be the guy next door.

His breath wheezed in and out of his mouth noisily, and I stood over him silently—utterly and completely silent. I could kill him. I could end this senseless violence right now. All I would have to do was tighten my finger on the trigger. I could even convince myself that nothing would happen when I pulled the trigger. That a bullet wouldn't come bursting out of the chamber and wouldn't rip down into real flesh and blood. I could pretend, just to make it easier.

My finger settled on the trigger, and I stared down at the monster that had dug up a sweet old man's grave and resurrected his ghost, forcing it to kill. I stared down at the man that had picked out and slaughtered three girls for no other reason than he wanted to. I stared down at him, and I wanted to make him stop. Yet…I couldn't do it. I couldn't pull the trigger.

I think he realized it too, at that moment, because his terror changed abruptly to something else. Before I knew it, his leg had swept out at my ankle, and I was suddenly falling.

I hit the ground hard, my breath leaving me in a heavy whoosh, and my head smashed sideways into the dirt. Fiat Man scrambled to his feet and took a step towards the doors while I was dazed.

"Stop," I gritted, rolling onto my side and training my gun on him. My word sounded funny to me, because there was a strange ringing in my ears. But he got the message, and he froze, one hand on the door. "I'll do it," I threatened, my finger back on the trigger even as ragged breaths shuddered my frame. I shook my head, trying to stop the ringing, but it didn't help.

Fiat Man looked down at me, lying in the dirt, and he smirked. "No, you won't," he said, his voice all muffled and tinny, and then he was gone.

I struggled to my feet, ankle throbbing, and dusted myself off, trying to catch my breath. The gun was heavy in my hand, and I couldn't stop shaking. But I had to pull it together, because I had to do this.

I had to do this or he would escape, and then more people would get hurt.

I had to do it.

I had to kill him.

I let out a small, pained whimper at the thought and moved forward, ready to do what I had to do.


	6. Pink Is The New Black

A/N: Thanks for the reviews! You guys are the best :)

* * *

Taking a deep breath, I stumbled forward—under the chain, out of the warehouse, into the open air. It was dark outside, and I took two limping, disoriented steps forward, trying to figure out which way Fiat Man had run. I didn't see him anywhere, and I couldn't hear his footsteps or breathing at all.

My stupid ears were still ringing, and for some reason, I was still shaking. It didn't even occur to me that his car wasn't exactly where he'd left it. It didn't even occur to me that he would be more interested in getting even than running away. I should've known better.

Should've but didn't. Story of my life.

In the end, it was his rust-heap car that saved me. The ringing in my ears was enough to cover the sound of his engine, but when it backfired, I heard it.

It came from my left, and I froze in shock as his car came barreling at me. If I hadn't seen it coming, I would have been dead. As it was, the backfires alerted me, and I was able to jump out of the way. Not quickly enough, though.

Something clipped my hip, and suddenly I was flying through the air. A split second later, I landed like a ragdoll, flopping and flailing and feeling my left arm snap underneath me. I came to a rolling stop, limbs all tangled, and I couldn't breathe. I couldn't scream. I couldn't do anything but lay there in agony.

The tires screeched loudly, and the car came to a stop only a foot from me. As I stared, badlyy dazed, up at the silver fender, the driver side door opened, and a pair of legs appeared in front of me. I couldn't move my head enough to look up, but I didn't have to. I knew who it was.

"You thought you could stop me, but you were weak. The weak ones always lose. They need to be culled out before they can bring the rest of us down with them." Fiat Man's words drifted down to me, and I tried to focus on them in an attempt to pull my brain away from the pain that was pounding and rushing through my body. Fiat Man leaned down, enough that his face was only a few feet above mine. "We're going to have so much fun together," he said, and his hand came out of nowhere to brush down my cheek.

White hot rage burst alive in my chest, making me feel like I was going to explode. I wanted to kill him. I wanted to fight him, to hit him, anything. "Kill you," I spat, spewing both blood and words out of my mouth at the same time.

He leaned away with a laugh before very deliberately tapping my injured arm with a toe. Even that single touch was enough to send agony ripping through it. "You? Kill me? Not likely." He grabbed me, then, hoisting me over his shoulder as he made his way back to the car.

He was going to kill me—take me somewhere and kill me. And since I did not want to be killed, I objected. Loudly.

And by loudly, I meant screaming as if there were a sledgehammer smashing my arm into tiny bone fragments with every beat of my heart. Because, really, that was kind of what it felt like.

When he tossed me in the trunk, I lost the ability to produce sound. I crash landed on my left side, and for a second, I think I passed out. The pain—I'd never felt anything so endless and agonizing in my life—turned my entire brain into a puddle of mindless goo. As the back hatch slammed down, and my world convalesced into a stuffy haze, I let myself go.

I drifted for bit, unable to really put coherent thoughts together, and then it all changed. There were three loud noises, like a backfire, but harsher. Gunshots, I realized, filtering back into reality. They were gunshots. Silence filled the air, blessed silence, and I pondered why there would be gunshots. When the car engine shut off, I pondered that too. My brain was too fried to come up with a valid reason, though, so I just kept loosely pondering things. It wasn't until there was a scratching noise against the back hatch, and it lifted to reveal Finn, that I understood.

Gunshots? Finn. Car rescue? Finn.

He was mess. His suit jacket was gone, there was blood on his shirt, and it was like he'd been rolled in a dirt burrito, but he still looked like Christmas morning. I don't think I'd ever been so glad to see someone in my entire life.

"Finn," I said quietly, devoting all my meager brain power into forming that one word.

He swore violently as he looked down at me, and there was rage on his face. Who knew I could illicit such emotions on my behalf? Certainly not I. I mean sure, Neal had beat the crap out of Seth Gunderson after the guy had slapped my butt in the cafeteria, but Finn's anger was on a whole other level.

"I'm okay," I managed to choke out, trying to calm the fury burning in his eyes and face. A muscle in his jaw twitched, but then he seemed to let some of it go. _Let it go, let it go_, I sang quietly to myself as my brain slowly slogged into gear.

"You need a doctor," he said harshly, but his hands were infinitely gentle as they skimmed over my body in search of the extent of my injuries. His fingers lingered over my arm, feather light, but still eliciting nauseating pain. _No gracias_, I wanted to tell him. _Mi arm-o es broken-o. _Which I supposed, in the realm of obvious statements to make, was pretty far up there.

My arm was hideous—very obviously broken and not cleanly. I fixed my eyes on the stars over his shoulder, trying not to look at the hard angles of bone that were jutting upwards and pressing tightly against the skin.

His thumb came up and wiped blood across my eyebrow, stopping it from dribbling into my eye. I would have done it ages ago had I not discovered that not moving was actually the closest I could get to any type of pain relief. Technically that included not breathing as well, but not breathing kind of negated the whole staying alive thing, so I just fought through the pain and chocked it up to the price of living.

And everyone knew that the price of living was ridiculously high in big cities. Hah! I'd just made a joke while trying not to curl up and die from pain. Dean would be proud of me. He'd always made jokes and references at inappropriate times, even if I hadn't understood them.

"Eh," I said with all false bravado I could muster in response to Finn's doctor comment. I was going to have a sarcastic comeback, but truth be told, I kind of felt like I was dying, and I couldn't come up with anything other than "eh." My entire left shoulder had gone numb, and I was in so much pain in so many places that it was just sort of mindless now.

Finn slipped an arm under my knees and another behind my shoulders, and suddenly I was being lifted out of the car. My eyes rolled back of their own accord as the hot, fresh agony blanked out my vision, but I didn't let go of my tenuous hold on consciousness. "Did you get 'em?" I murmured, feeling like a typical Hollywood actress as my forehead lolled into the crook of his neck.

"I got him," Finn confirmed, voice rumbling in his throat against my forehead.

"I couldn't," I said thickly, unable to form any more words past those two. More blood came out of my mouth, dribbling his shirt. Finn didn't complain, though. He just kept walking, and I struggled through the basics of the English language in order to build a sentence. "I had a chance, but I couldn't do it," I finally got out, my voice breaking pathetically as I said it.

I wanted to say something, wanted to explain, but I was too tired.

The fact of the matter was I couldn't do it. I couldn't kill a human. Fiat Man had been a terrible, evil person, but I still hadn't been able to look him in the eyes and pull the trigger. I wasn't sure if I'd ever be able to do it. Part of me knew that being unable to kill a person was potentially bad for my survival—case in point. But the other part of me didn't care.

"I know," Finn said quietly, and I think he understood. Or at least I hoped he did.

"I'm sorry," I murmured into his dirty, blood splattered shirt.

"Don't apologize," he said. "Not for that."

A car door opened, and suddenly I was lying across the backseat. Finn's warmth left me, and I almost wanted to cry. Pathetic.

Finn got in the driver seat, but instead of turning the car on, he twisted in his seat to look at me. It was dark, but I could still see his profile as he gazed at me. "Never for that," he said softly. Then he turned back around, starting the car, and blackness drifted over me like a blanket.

I woke up feeling strangely light. Light-ish. _Fuzzy_, I decided with vague dismissal. My tongue felt really thick and my body dull, but I felt like I was on top of the world.

Getting hit by a car flashed to the front of my mind, and it was a reminder I could have done without. Ugh, I had been hit by a car, and it had not been pleasant. But then Finn had taken me away. To a hospital, I would have thought. But I didn't feel like I was in a hospital.

"Finn?" I queried, opening my eyes and looking around.

I was in a room. That much I understood. In whose room or where, I hadn't the faintest clue.

"What." The grouchy, muffled utterance came from below me, and it wasn't a question, his tone made that clear. I raised my head, pleased to find the ringing in my ears gone. I was on a bed. A nice bed. A really, really nice bed. And just over the edge, Finn was lying on the floor. He had a pillow, and a thin blanket, but the carpet didn't look as comfortable as my bed. Too bad for him, he was totally missing out.

"Where am I?" was the first thing to come flying out of my mouth. I looked around and answered my own question. I was in motel—in a really comfortable bed, but definitely in a motel. "Never mind," I said quietly. "How'd I get here?"

Finn didn't answer, and I rolled onto my right side so I could look at him. My body ached vaguely at the movement, but I wasn't too bothered. I wanted answers more than comfort.

Finn was lying on his stomach, arms disappearing under the pillow while his face was buried in it. I tried not to focus on how his t-shirt stretched over the curve of his back, or how his hair looked like it was going in every direction possible.

"Finn?" I prompted uneasily, taking in the bright pink cast on my left arm. There was also a bandage on my other hand and a bottle of pills on the nightstand. Oh, those were probably responsible for the happy, pain-free cloud I was floating on. "Finn," I repeated, louder this time.

"What?" he groaned, shifting around a bit but not getting up.

"What the hell is going on?" I hissed, starting to freak out a little. I didn't know where I was. I didn't know how I had somehow gotten fixed up after getting hit by a car, and I didn't know what day or time it was. Basically, I knew nothing, and it was starting to scare me.

"Took you to a free clinic," Finn moaned into the pillow. He lifted his head blearily, glaring in a vaguely upward direction. "Said it was a hit-and-run. They fixed you up, and we split before they could ask questions. That was early yesterday morning. You've been asleep the whole time, and I have not. Now can you just take a pain pill and shut up, please?" His head thumped back down onto the pillow, ending his exposition, and I rolled onto my back.

Holy crap. I had been hit by a car and broken my arm, and Finn had shot the serial killer who'd done it. What the heck kind of day was that supposed to be? I fingered the hard shell of my cast, distracted by how clean and bright it was. Then I sat up abruptly. Holy crap, what was I going to tell Libby? I had one more day before I had to pick her up. Even worse, what was I going to tell my family? More lies, I supposed.

The happy feeling faded, and I submerged into dreary melancholy. I was tired of lying, tired of balancing two lives. _Them's the waters_, I told myself harshly, canceling my little pity party. _What are you going to do, cry about it?_

Actually yes, I kind of wanted to cry. But that might have just been the pain meds wearing off. I rolled onto my side again, struggling one handed with the bottle of pills. At one point it went flying out of my hand and landed on Finn's back. He didn't move, and I stared down at my bottle with disgust. "Huh," I grunted to myself. My arm ached a little more insistently, and I kicked myself into action.

Hanging off the bed, I swiped my good hand at the bottle, missing the first time but snagging it the second. "Hah!" But then I wheeled my arm around wildly, trying to get myself back onto the bed so I wouldn't come crashing down on Finn. It was really hard, and it took a long time, seriously depleting my energy even though it was only one simple task.

I lay back, gasping, and then I used my left hand to pin the bottle down and my right to twist the cap off. Rooting around with a finger, I slid one pill up the side of the bottle and into my hand. I didn't even look at it as I tossed it into my mouth and swallowed. Thoughtfully enough, Finn had left a glass of water on the nightstand, and I chased the pill down with a good swallow or two of water. The medicine took a while to kick in, but once it did, I felt good enough to do something other than lay there.

Easing myself off the end of the bed, I went to the bathroom and stood in front of the mirror. From the neck up, I looked fine. But any further down and fine was pushing the truth a little. My original shirt was gone, which was awkward. I was wearing a thin hospital-type shirt—thin, white, not very high quality. It was a pretty stark contrast to the cast, which covered from just under my fingers and knuckles all the way up until past my elbow. It was giant and pink, and I was glad. It nicely detracted from the bruising I could see leading up under my sleeve. I pulled my sleeve up further, gagging at the gross pattern of purples and browns and yellows.

I let go of my sleeve and pulled up the bottom of my shirt a little. Yep, the bruising traced down my left side to my hip. Ugh, gross. I dropped my shirt and decided that I would definitely be wearing a hoodie when I drove to Seattle. If I could even get a hoodie on. I was on pain meds, and my body _still_ kind of ached. I wasn't looking forward to wrestling something over my head and arms.

I blew air out of my lips, causing them to putter and flap. I had almost died. That was weird to think about. I shook my head, not wanting to think about it at all. I wanted food and my stuff. That was what I wanted to think about.

I stepped out of the bathroom, surveying Finn's limp form. "I'm going to run an errand. Is that okay with you?" I didn't really care if it was okay with him or not, but since he'd taken care of me, I felt it was a courtesy to at least ask. He didn't answer, clearly passed out. "Okay, I'll take that as a yes," I said cheerfully. I found a piece of paper and wrote him a note before I left, though. I didn't want him to wake up and freak out. Not that he would anyway. As an afterthought, I wrote my phone number on the paper, just in case he needed to get in touch. But it also meant that I had to find my phone.

I thought back to where it might be. Oh, it was in my Hunting backpack, which was probably still in Finn's car. That was fine though, my motel key was in the pack, too.

Clicking the motel room door shut behind me, I sighed into the fresh air. The sky was once again overcast, and the air was crisp. I loved it. Swinging Finn's borrowed keys around on my finger, I walked to his car and unlocked the passenger side door. Pulling my backpack free, I relocked the door and headed back inside. My pack didn't have any food in it, other than an ancient granola bar, but it did have spare clothes.

I changed quickly, shaking out the wrinkles in the t-shirt shirt and jeans. They'd been in there a while, and they'd been folded tightly to take up the least room. Oh well, at this point I wasn't totally concerned with how I looked. Almost dying seems to cancel out vanity in a girl.

Dropping the pain pills into one of the smaller pockets of the backpack, I replaced Finn's keys where I'd found them. Then I headed out. Once in the parking lot, I oriented myself as best I could and started walking towards my motel.

Fifteen minutes later, my stomach was practically playing some growled version of an eighties rock song, and I changed my mind about the age and edible quality of the granola bar, and I scarfed it down.

Half an hour later, I found myself walking into my motel room. I hadn't unpacked much, so it was easy to get my duffle bag and bag of groceries ready to go out to the car. Gathering them up, I stopped abruptly, realizing I didn't have a car. Oops. It was still at the warehouse, and there was no way I was going to walk that far.

"Hmmm," I intoned, pondering my options. I was probably just going to have to walk back to Finn's, and then he could drop me off at the warehouse in his car. Yeah. That was probably what was going to have to happen.

Slinging the duffle strap over my good shoulder, I put on my backpack and picked up the groceries in my right hand. I left the motel key card on the table and walked out of the room, heading back to Finn's motel.

The walk took a lot longer. For one, I had to stop and take breaks frequently. Who knew getting hit by a car took so much energy to heal from? I also had to take out the pain pills and see when the soonest time I could safely take another was.

I took another pain pill when I got back to Finn's room. I was technically not supposed to, but I didn't care. I was in pain, and I wanted to not be. Finn, for his part, was still out. Though, if he'd stayed up for as long as he'd said, then I didn't blame him.

I ate my salad right out of the bag, ignoring the fact that the leaves were kind of wilted. Then I made myself a Nutella and banana sandwich. It was glorious, and I wondered if I'd ever be able to go back to plain old peanut butter again.

Still reveling in the invention that was chocolate and hazelnut, I camped out on the bed and turned on the TV. There was nothing good on, but I watched it anyways. There was something normalizing about zoning out with daytime TV.

Finn let out a soft snore, and I changed the channel. For a second, it was almost like we were just two normal people. And dang, had I missed that feeling.


	7. Normal Is Good, But Still Overrated

A/N: Muahaha, last chapter. Winchester shenanigans, here we come. I'll post the teaser for the new story soon. Soon-ish. :)

* * *

Finn woke up a few hours later. It reminded me of Dean, who claimed he only really needed four hours of sleep to function. Maybe Finn was the same way, I pondered, watching as he got up and stumbled to the bathroom before pausing in the doorway. "You went out?" he asked blearily, catching sight of my bags.

"Yep," I replied cheerfully, wondering if he was going to get annoyed. If he did, I was going to make the argument that just because I had a broken arm didn't mean I was an invalid. Besides, it was none of his business what I did. But in the end, my prepared defenses were unnecessary.

"'k," was all he said before closing the door and starting the shower.

"Ok," I echoed, staring at the TV and slipping my right arm under my head.

When I finally heard the shower turn off, I clicked off the TV and went to make Finn a sandwich. I didn't know if he wanted one or not, but my brothers had never, ever turned down free food. And I didn't see any other food around, so maybe Finn would be hungry.

He took forever in the bathroom—longer than any of my brothers had ever taken and maybe even longer than me. I was just about to see if he was still alive when he answered that question for me.

"Can you, uh, help me for a second?" Finn called out of the bathroom, and the door swung open.

"Sure," I called back, hopping out of my chair and making my way over to the doorway. When I got there, I spun quickly in an abrupt about face, covering my eyes with my good hand. "Oh my gosh! What the heck, Finn?"

Finn was perched on the back of the toilet. I didn't so much care that he was shirtless—shirtless men were kind of a common occurrence in my house what with three brothers and rotating sports seasons. No, what grossed me out was the fact that Finn was carefully sliding a needle in and out of his skin.

I turned back and opened my fingers, watching through a tiny slit. He was stitching a half an inch wide bloody groove that started on high on the front of his shoulder and went over and back. "Wow," I reiterated, this time with a little less ghastly squeamishness in my voice.

"Bullet grazed me at the warehouse," he grunted, face screwed up with concentration. "I tried to close the wound earlier, but the bandages wouldn't keep it shut. And I couldn't reach the very back by myself, but you're awake now, so you can just get that part."

"Why didn't you get the trained professionals to do it at the clinic?" I demanded in a strangled tone.

"They're obligated to report gunshot wounds. I don't need that kind of attention. Besides, it's not a big deal. I've done this plenty of times. I just can't reach the last bit reaching over my shoulder." Finn was so calm, so freaking calm, and I didn't understand how he could be while sewing himself up. Nerves of steel, I guess.

Finn twisted on the toilet, presenting the last bit of wound to me. It would only take a few stitches to finish, but he was right: it was just out of his reach. "Ok, put the gloves on and just copy the movement you saw me do."

I gave the back of his head a freaked out look. "I am _not_ comfortable with this," I stated for the record, pulling on the blue latex gloves. The edge of my cast stretched the glove almost humorously, but it was lost on me. Nothing about this situation was funny.

Finn leaned his head to the right a little, giving me more room to work. "You kill monsters for a living. A little First Aid should be a piece of cake."

I took the small, hooked needle from him with trepidation, shuddering a bit as blood transferred from his hand to my gloved fingers. Blood. Finn's blood. Ew. There was a reason I was completely uninterested in the medical field.

Finn must have sensed my hesitation. "I won't feel it," he promised. "I already numbed the area with some anesthetic." He was so chill about it all that I wanted to be sick.

"Oh, because that makes it _so _much better," I snapped, still obsessively fixated on the blood smearing the fingers of my glove.

He didn't get offended or annoyed, which meant he had more self-control than I did. "You can do this," he said quietly. "Just take a deep breath and get it over with."

I tore my eyes away from the blood and looked at his shoulder. I could do this. Three more stitches and I would be done. Taking a big breath, I guided the needle through one edge of the wound, just like I'd seen Finn do a minute ago. Then I went through the other edge, slowly pulling the thread through and closing off a little more of the furrow. I did it again, and again, one more time. Then Finn instructed me on how to tie it off and cut the thread.

I took a step back almost feeling dizzy. Finn twisted his head around, looking at me. "Riley, you have to let the breath out. You were supposed to take a deep breath _and_ let it out."

I stared at him with wide eyes, and then the breath I had been accidentally holding came rushing out. Oh. Maybe forgetting to breathe was why I felt so dizzy. Whoops.

Finn shook his head and stood up, reaching for some bandages. "Thanks," he said. "I can take it from here." I backed out of the bathroom, still a little dazed. Blood. I was not good with blood. Not my own, not other people's. Yuck, yuck, yuck. Dried blood, I could handle. Real blood, coming out of real people, not so much.

Stripping off my gloves, I threw them away as fast as I could. Then I sat at the tiny table, trying not to be sick. Finn came out of the bathroom a few minutes later, pulling on a shirt in slow, careful movements.

I pushed the sandwich towards him, and he ate it in less than five bites. I watched in half-hearted fascination. When he was done, I made him another sandwich, and he devoured that one too. Guys, yeesh.

After that, Finn got a box of cereal out of his car. No milk, just cereal. He tore the bag open and took a handful. I dubiously took some when he angled the box towards me, but I held it in my hand until he started eating his. Then I picked one crunchy rectangle up and popped it in my mouth. It was kind of stale, but at the same time I didn't care. This was fun, just hanging out and eating. It was _normal_, and that made it all the more precious.

"So, am I your first?" Finn asked curiously, after swallowing a mouthful.

"Excuse me?" I was confused—and slightly embarrassed at the semi-inappropriate place my mind initially jumped to. I took an excessively long time opening the Nutella jar, and then I scraped a piece of cereal along the side of the mouth to cover it in deliciousness. Popping the whole thing in my mouth, I chewed slowly. But since passive-aggressive chewing wasn't the best stall tactic, I finished up and made another Nutella-cereal treat, this time offering it to Finn. I wasn't a five star chef, that much was obvious, but there was no resisting Nutella.

"Your first Hunter," Finn explained, accepting it warily. "Am I the first Hunter you've met? I can only assume you haven't been doing this long." Then he took a bite, trying to look innocent. Turd.

I ignored his obvious nod towards my inexperience and shook my head. "No, I met a couple of guys. They took care of some vampires that tried to, you know, kidnap and turn me."

Finn's eyebrows shot up for a second, but then his face lit up with a small, crooked smile. It was a good look on him. Sometimes he seemed too serious and businesslike. "Vampires. Wow, what a way to find out about this life." He shook his head. "Who was it? If you don't mind my asking."

I shrugged, trying to squeeze a couple fingers down the inside my cast to relieve a certain horribly pesky itch on my arm. Finn caught my fingers and pulled them with an absent frown. I sighed, thwarted, then answered his question. "Uh, I didn't catch their last names, but…Sam and Dean. They're brothers." Finn's jaw dropped, and it was the first time I had seen him speechless. I sat up, startled. "What? Is that…is that bad?"

Suddenly I felt like I was supposed to pass a test, and I had given the wrong answer. But Finn shook his head, finally getting around to words. "You met the Winchesters? Sam and Dean Winchester?"

"Yes?" I said uncertainly in a tiny voice, unsure why he was so worked up about it. "Really tall one, really sarcastic one. Bad-ass car?"

Finn flung his hands in the air and turned away. "Unbelievable. Un-freaking-believable."

"They were really nice. And…and good at their jobs," I said defensively, thinking maybe he had some sort of problem with them.

He snorted. "Oh, I bet they were. Riley, the Winchesters are like the frigging Wright brothers of Hunters."

I frowned. "The airplane inventor guys?" I asked skeptically.

"They're smart and fearless and relentless and I, uh, I'm not…explaining this well." He rubbed his eyebrow with a finger, thoughtful and focused. "Nothing fazes them—spirits, wendigos, demons, skin changers, black dogs, nothing. I mean, people tell stories about the Winchesters. My _mother_ told me stories about them. They're like, they're like—"

I sat up, suddenly excited. "Harry Potter and Ron Weasley?" Those were the two biggest names I could come up with. Never mind that they were fictional characters.

"What? No," Finn said quickly, giving me a weird look. Then he acquiesced. "Well, okay, yes. Kind of."

I flapped a hand excitedly, thinking of my time with Sam and Dean. We had totally been a team for, like, a day and a half. "Does that make me Hermione, then?"

Finn scowled, giving me a completely blunt answer. "No, that makes you that one random girl who got frozen by the basilisk."

I gasped, offended. Then I realized he was kind of right. No way was I Hermione Granger material. Even so, I was totally excited that he got my Harry Potter references. Maybe Finn wasn't a complete turd after all.

Something he'd said gave me pause, though. "Your, uh, mom told you about Sam and Dean? Does that mean she's a Hunter too? Wait…how long have you been Hunting?"

Finn's face went blank, and I felt like I'd stepped on a landmine. Bad subject for him, then. "A long time," he said stiffly, and left it at that. Then he tried to distract me. "How did you get into Hunting? Ten words or less, go."

I glanced down at my cast, itching my thumb for a second. I wanted to push, wanted to find out more about Finn. At the same time, I didn't want to alienate the first guy who might be able to tell me more about Hunting. So I allowed his abrupt change of topic to pass. "Uh," I said, thinking it through. Then I held up my hands, ready to count my words off on my fingers. "Biological. Father. And. Vampire. Minions. Tried. To. Turn. Me. Winchesters." I turned my palms toward him and wiggled my fingers. "Ten words, boom."

Finn looked like he was about to say something, but my phone rang, startling us both. I glanced at the screen and gagged. Then I pasted a bright smile on my face—as if that would help brighten my attitude and countenance—and answered the phone.

"Hi, Mom," I said, trying to be cheery.

"Hi…Riley…" she said, immediately on guard. Oops, abandon falsely cheery ship, abandon falsely cheery ship.

"Mom, I need to tell you something," I said, back to my serious self.

"Oh my gosh, you're pregnant," she shrieked.

"What? No!" I yelped, completely indignant. "Why would you even say that? What the heck do you think I've been doing up here in my free time, sleeping around?" Finn raised his eyebrows at that, but I shot him a death glare.

"No, no. You're right," she amended, her voice going down a couple decibels. "I'm sorry. I just panicked and said the first thing that came to mind. What is it, sweetie?"

"I had an accident. I was a total spaz and kind of fell down some stairs." I played it off as no big deal, and I knew my parents weren't the type to wildly panic about things like broken bones or concussions. Three rambunctious sons had cured them of that. Still, they were warier when it came to me—the only girl in my family. "I'm fine," I interjected quickly, before she could freak out. "I just broke my arm and got a few scrapes. No biggie."

A broken arm and a few-ish scrapes, yeah. I was willing to completely overlook the fact that my entire left side looked like one big tribal tattoo made of bruises. It wasn't something I wanted to share with the world, much less my mother.

She did the required parental simpering for a few minutes, and I reassured her multiple times that I was fine. Finn just looked amused at the whole thing. Turd. "I got a bright pink cast, though. So that's cool," I said, wrapping the conversation up. "And don't worry. Libby can drive us home, just to be safe."

My mom was silent for a long moment, and a prickle of unease filtered through me. "Are you…are you okay?" she asked quietly. I raised my eyebrows at her "serious Mom" mode, noting how swift the change had been. "Ever since…that week…you've been more serious, more focused."

I thought about it, knowing exactly which week she was talking about. The week where everything had changed—monsters, discovering I was adopted. And yes, I was more serious and more focused. I had to be, in my line of work. The line of work I had chosen for myself. The line of work that involved killing things so that they didn't kill innocent people. God, if only she knew.

Mom hesitated; I could hear the hitched breath on the other end of the phone. "I just want to make sure you're living a little. You know? Having fun, meeting boys, doing what you love…" She petered off, sounding a little bit worried and discouraged—like it was her letting me down and not the other way around.

I leaned back in my chair and chewed on my lip, absently watching as Finn ate a handful of cereal then start typing on his laptop. "Yeah, Mom, I'm good. I really am. I have my art, and I've been working." Realizing how lame that sounded, I threw her a bone. "Oh, and I met a guy the other day. He and I really hit it off, which was weird because, you know, I'm…me. We met and kind of explored the city a little. It was all very spontaneous." I wasn't sure how my mother felt about spontaneity in relationships, but anything had to be better than how dismal my life must have sounded to her.

Finn glanced up at my redacted version of the past few days, and he looked unamused. I shrugged and mouthed "sorry" to him as my mother went ecstatic in my ear, demanding to know details and if he was cute or not.

"Yeah, a total cutie," I dutifully confirmed, silently laughing when Finn pulled a face. "He was a few years older than me, but definitely more mature than guys my age, you know?" She was really getting excited about this, and I didn't hold back. "Mh hmm, such a dreamboat," I added, just to annoy Finn. He narrowed his eyes at me, but I just grinned. I couldn't help it. The melancholy was gone, and I just felt happy, I didn't know why. I just did.

The conversation ended pretty quickly after that, my mom and I weirdly happy. I hung up, suddenly feeling shy, but Finn just rolled his eyes and went back to typing. He was researching, and I was researching. We were almost a team, for a while. It was nice.

As the day progressed, Finn and I basically lounged around the motel room, looking for new jobs and shooting random questions at each other. I found out he had a mother that was off Hunting, and he found out the bigger picture as to how I first got into Hunting. He told me his favorite color was blue, and I told him I couldn't name a favorite TV show because I watched too many.

Around five, Finn ordered some pizza. He ate, like, six slices, and I ate two, throwing a piece of my crust at him when I found out he'd never seen Lord of the Rings. He caught and then ate my piece of crust, citing that he didn't have time to watch movies. I scowled at him, both for my pizza crust and for his dismal lack of self-initiated entertainment.

Around six, I could tell Finn was starting to fade. I insisted he take the bed, and he declined with typical chivalrous drabble. But he was tired, and if his hobbling about—and occasional winces during random movements—was anything to go by, the floor had not been as kind to him as the bed had been to me. I countered his nonsense, albeit polite and wonderful nonsense, by telling him that I was just going to be researching anyway and that I wasn't even tired, which was true.

Finally, Finn relented, easing himself onto the bed with a soft groan. He was completely out of it in less than a minute. Shaking my head, I opened the lid of my laptop. I really was going to do research. Kind of. Something had been bugging me for a while now, and I finally knew what I wanted to do about it.

Opening a Word document, I had started compiling everything I knew about the supernatural. It was weird, and it was random. At first, it was just a random hodgepodge of things I'd learned. But then—then page after page filled up, and I moved the scattered pieces around to slowly build my first few solid reports of a supernatural creatures.

I started with vampires. Everything I knew about them went under that heading. Observations, susceptibilities, how to kill them, feeding habits—stuff like that. Then came spirits, since that had been my second experience. That heading had the most under it, too. It made sense, though. A majority of my jobs had been spirits. I also left a blank space in the document for where I planned to put a sketch of the altar and Fiat Man's talisman thing. The next heading was for changelings. There wasn't much info on them, but I put in everything I could remember. Synovial fluid, fire, underground hiding—the whole shebang.

Then, on the last page, I entered the contact information for any other Hunters I knew, which was a grand total of four now.

Sitting back in my chair, I surveyed my work. It wasn't much, but it was a start. The next time I was at the store, I was going to pick up a binder and some clear page holders. Then I would print my stuff off and put it all in the binder to create a kind of log book or reference book. That way, it would be easily updatable if I discovered something new or if I came across new information on previously encountered creatures.

I continued to work on and think about my new creation until my eyes got heavy. I'd told Finn that I wasn't tired, but it was several hours later, and I was seriously struggling. I'd taken the second pain pill around three, so I was technically due another dose. _Imma go get it_, I decided, _right after I close my eyes for one second_.

The next morning Finn found me slumped at the table. He shook me awake with a touch to the shoulder and presented me with a cup of coffee. I took it greedily from him and then sat there, hunched over it, letting the aroma flood my senses.

Coffee—one of life's great gifts.

"You're headed out today, to pick up your friend." It wasn't really a question, so I just nodded as an answer, and Finn subsided into thoughtful silence. I let him stew, knowing he'd say whatever was really on his mind when he was ready.

"It was nice," he said finally, a couple minutes later. "Not being alone after…what happened."

After shooting someone? Yeah, I could see how being alone might compound and magnify every doubt or shred of guilt he felt over it. I nodded, not really knowing what to say in return.

Or maybe he just didn't like being alone. I know I didn't. Not for prolonged periods anyhow. I didn't mind it on a day-to-day basis now that I was Hunting and didn't actually want people to know about what I did. But being with Finn? Being with someone who understood what I was doing?

"Yeah, it's nice," I agreed, meaning it wholeheartedly. I took a sip of my coffee, thinking this was probably the most normal prolonged encounter with a guy—outside of high school and my family—that I'd ever had, which was saying something since this was hardly normal.

I picked up my phone, texting Libby that I was only thirty minutes out and would text her again when I was leaving. Then I focused back on Finn. "Thanks," I told him, motioning to my cast.

He shrugged. "Don't worry about it." Then he ran a hand over his jaw, sighing, intense gray eyes watching me. Jeez, he was like a mini-Dean. It was seriously uncanny. "If I'm ever in Portland, I'll give you a call. Teach you how to shoot or something."

I grinned. "Deal," I said, extending my hand.

He shook it, skin rough and warm against mine. Then I stood up, and he helped me carry my stuff out to his car. We didn't talk on the drive to find my car, and when we reached it, the silence was almost a little awkward. We both got out, and I transferred my stuff over to the trunk of my Civic. Then we met by the hood, just…resting on it quietly.

It was all very strange, and it felt like one of those awkward moments where the guy and the girl are standing on the porch steps, trying to figure out how to say goodbye to each other.

"You gonna be okay driving with a bum arm?" Finn asked, finally breaking the silence.

I shrugged before realizing how much that specific movement hurt and how often I seemed to do it. "Yeah," I said, wiggling the fingers of my right hand at him. "I perfected one-handed driving when I started drinking coffee in the car. Besides, Libby may make a stink about driving a Prius, but she drives stick with the best of them."

Another long pause.

"I'll be okay. I will," I added seriously, as an afterthought, wondering if that's what he was really asking.

He nodded, lips pursed. Then he rubbed the back of his neck with a hand. Another Dean-ism. "Well, you have my number, and I have yours. So, I guess I'll see you around?"

"Yeah, uh, see you." I hesitated on the hood of my car, and neither of us moved. Finally, I took the initiative and pushed off, heading to the driver's seat. "I better get going. Libby will be waiting."

"Yeah," is all he said, but he stood up and moved away from my car a little.

"Okay, bye," I said awkwardly.

"Bye," he echoed as I climbed in and closed the door.

_Headed your way_, I texted Libby. As soon as the message sent, I tossed my phone onto the passenger seat and started my car. Giving Finn one last wave, I pulled out and started driving away from the warehouse.

"See you later," I whispered quietly, watching Finn get smaller and smaller in my mirror. "I really hope I do."


	8. W Teaser

A/N: Woohoo! Here's a glimpse of my newest creation. :) This one features boatloads (hah, I made a terrible pun that you guys won't understand until later) more Winchester presence than the last few stories. Cheerio!

* * *

The waves swamped forward, propelling me one last time towards the beach before I crashed down into the sand, heaving for breath and ignoring the grit that was sucked into my mouth as I did. Beside me, Finn was still completely limp. I scrabbled at his shoulders with numb fingers, too exhausted to do anything more than drag him forward a few more inches out of the water. "Finn?" I pleaded, my voice cracking weakly. Nothing. "Finn, say something." I pleaded with him further, but he was silent. Silent and still.

Finally I rolled onto my side, struggling for several long minutes just to get my phone out of my pocket and then to open the plastic baggie it was stored inside. The shivers that wracked me didn't help, and neither did the cold crests of waves that broke over our feet and seeped up around our chests before receding again. Rinse and repeat.

Except this wasn't a shampoo commercial. This was real life, and I was terrified. "Finn," I pleaded one last time. "Wake up." He didn't.

By the time the bag in my numb hands finally tore open, and I wanted to celebrate, but my head felt all funny and spinney even though I was lying on the ground. I shook it once, but that just made the problem worse. The water washed up my calves and then thighs and then to my chest. It was horridly cold, and I shivered again, holding my phone above it all.

The cold water _did_ shock the world into becoming clear again, though, so I took advantage of the temporary clarity to fumble weakly at the buttons. _Number one, number one, numberonenumberonenumberone,_ I intoned dully to myself, watching as the buttons fuzzed and blurred in and out of my vision. I pressed number one and then the dial button, and miraculously the phone made the call. My arms became too tired to hold even my small cellphone up, so I dropped them to my chest and rested the phone against my neck.

It rang three times and that was it, but for some reason that was funny to me. I couldn't fathom why, but somewhere in my sluggish mind, it was friggin' hilarious.

A few seconds later, I realized that there was a comforting buzz on the other end, and I had to think about what I was even supposed to be doing. The buzz came again, this time more insistent, and I gradually remembered. "Dean," I whimpered into the phone. "Dean, help." I wanted to say more, to let him know where I was, but I couldn't. I couldn't because suddenly I didn't know anymore, and all I wanted to do was close my eyes. So I did.

And blackness came, taking away the pain in my body and the coldness around me.


End file.
